


PEARL'S BIZARRE ADVENTURE

by lorekeepers



Category: Pocket Monsters | Pokemon (Main Video Game Series), Pocket Monsters: Sun & Moon | Pokemon Sun & Moon Versions
Genre: Alola-chihou | Alola Region (Pokemon), CANON IS A FUCK WE DONT CARE ABOUT CANON IN THIS HOUSE, Canon Rewrite, Lighthearted, Multi, Pokemon Journey, Rated T for swearing, actually everyone is autistic in this au thanks bye, autistic protagonist, i accidentally retconned zmoves and went with it also, varying degrees of ooc
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-20
Updated: 2021-02-18
Packaged: 2021-03-08 00:01:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 25,617
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26566255
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lorekeepers/pseuds/lorekeepers
Summary: Pearl receives a plane ticket to Alola for her 15th birthday. What adventures will she encounter?Crossposted from Toyhouse. It's an OC pokemon adventure fic, sorry if you came here expecting anything else!
Relationships: Burnet-hakase | Professor Burnet/Kukui-hakase | Professor Kukui, Lilie | Lillie/Original Pokemon Trainer(s), colress/n/original female character
Kudos: 2





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> Hi! I like including forewords because it lets me give some added context to the story. You can skip this if you'd like, but it still provides some useful information.
> 
> Moon is a bit like a nuzlocke comic of Pokemon Moon except a) nobody dies and b) it's not a comic. It goes over the adventures of Pearl in the Alola region alongside her pokemon and human companions!
> 
> Here's some things to keep in mind:
> 
> \--I’ve revised this myself as well as had some friends go over it but there might be inconsistencies that are missed. I'm doing this for fun (and because quarantine is giving me too much time) so don't roast me if I spell words wrong.  
> \--Canon characters may be varying degrees of 'OOC'. This is because canon is my sandbox and I am an unsupervised toddler in the playground (which is to say I do what I want).  
> \--A very basic understanding of the Pokemon universe would be generally beneficial in reading this, but it can be read without!  
> \--AO3 might have messed up the formatting on some chapters and removed the emphasis on words - I tried my best to restore them but it still might not look how it was supposed to.  
> \--This story makes use of textlogs. The text was originally colored (as this is a toyhouse crosspost), but uh. I don't think I can do that on ao3. So use context clues and typing styles for reference I guess!  
> \--Pearl, Hau, and Lillie are all aged 15, unlike the canon 11 just because idk how to write young kids  
> \--This was intended to be read with at least vague context of the ocs included, you can read about them here; https://toyhou.se/zinnia/characters/folder:148355  
> \--This is my first time posting to AO3 in like 2 years lol

Light streamed through the opened pink curtains, marking the start of a new day. But it wasn’t just any new day, at least not for Pearl.

A soft knock fell upon Pearl’s bedroom door, prompting her to wake up with a groan. She didn’t say anything, but the person at the door cracked it open a bit anyways to speak.

“Pearls…? Are you awake yet?”

It was Pearl’s mother, Emmy. She spoke softly, as to not wake Pearl if she had been sleeping. Pearl just rolled over in bed to face her mom at the door. 

“ _Mom…_ give me like, 15 more minutes… I wanna sleep in, it’s my birthday…” Pearl said, rolling back over and shoving her face into her pillow. Emmy just tilted her head and gave Pearl a small smile.

“Well, if you say so. But I’ll keep the door cracked open in case a visito-” Emmy paused, looking back behind her. “Well, here she comes now!”

The padding of small feet could be heard by Pearl, and she lifted her head to see Izzy, the family’s pet vaporeon, trotting her way over to Pearl. Izzy got up on her hind legs, putting her front paws on the edge of Pearl’s bed, and just stared at her. Pearl stared back for a couple seconds, before eventually sitting up and rubbing her eyes.

Pearl then grabbed Izzy from under the arms, lifting her up onto her bed. She scritched just under Izzy’s neck, which caused her to flop over and purr.

Emmy, still looking onwards, smiled and let out a small laugh.

“Aw, that’s cute. Well, I’m gonna head downstairs - don’t take too long to wake yourself up.” she said, before slinking out of the door’s view and down the stairs.

“Alright!” Pearl yelled down, petting Izzy some more as she spoke. She looked to the pokemon, and ruffled her fins a bit before boosting herself out of bed. Pearl grabbed her yellow ribbon that she had left hanging over her bed, and went over to the mirror to tie it over her hair - just like she did every morning.

Today was the day of Pearl’s 15th birthday. But in Pearl’s mind, it wasn’t just another birthday - because she had remembered a promise her parents made to her 5 years ago, and was excited to see if they had kept it.

Pearl practically glided down the staircase, which led into the open living room space where she could see her family was waiting. It wasn’t just her parents - Pearl’s aunts Zinnia and Aster were there as well.

As Pearl skidded across the hardwood flooring, Pearl’s other mother Renee perked up from where she was sitting at the couch. She turned around, and with a massive smile on her face;

“Happy birthday Pearl!”

Renee’s words were soon followed by those of Emmy and Pearl’s aunts - it appeared that they had all been waiting downstairs for Pearl to wake up.

“Goodmorning!!” Pearl said with a smile, flapping her hands excitedly. Her eyes drifted from her family to the large wrapped box that was positioned on the coffee table. Pearl walked closer, and noticed a small envelope was also on the table - but Pearl’s attention was entirely on the large present awaiting her.

It was about as long and wide as a person, and as Pearl laid her hand on the gift, she looked onwards to her mothers and spoke up.

“Is it alright if I open it?” she asked.

“Well, that’s your gift from Aster and Zinnia, but we had planned on you opening the envelope first-” Renee said, but her words were cut off before she could properly finish.

“Open it! Open it! Open it!” Zinnia began to chant, eliciting a snicker from Aster and a frustrated sigh from Emmy and Renee.

“Ok, go ahead… just don’t… take it out of the box in the house, _please._ ” Emmy sighed, putting her palm to her face.

Pearl seemed a tad confused, but was excited to open her gift nonetheless. 

She tore through the pink wrapping paper to reveal a deep red casket box - not unlike those used for ornate jewelry, but larger. Pearl lifted the top of the box open, and when she was what was inside, she gasped, and her eyes grew shiny and a massive smile sprawled across her face.

Inside the box, resting on an ivory-colored silk bed, was an exaggerated zanbatō-style sword, not unlike those Pearl had seen in anime she watched. The entire weapon was a rosey-gold color, almost looking pink. The grip was decorated with a baby pink ribbon, and the chappe had an elaborate light-golden swirl design. The actual blade was large, being about as wide as Pearl’s laptop’s screen. Located near the point were 3 rectangular holes in the blade’s metal.

Pearl was practically jumping up and down, while her parents held their breath in the background.

“ _A SWORD?!_ Are you kidding me?! This is so freakin’ cool!” Pearl said, turning towards Aster to give her a hug, while Zinnia joined from the side of the couch where she was sitting.

“I made sure to look at those shows you watch to get the design just right - I wanted to make something that would fit you and your interests!” Aster said, looking quite proud of herself.

“It’s perfect! It’s just like if I had my own magical girl weapon!” Pearl said, before breaking the hug and looking a bit puzzled.

“But… how did you convince them to-” before being cut off, Pearl gestured towards Renee and Emmy, who were watching the exchange. Emmy interrupted her.

“Aster begged me. _Incessantly. For YEARS._ ” Emmy said with a deep sigh.

“Hey, I didn’t _beg_! I just said she’d like it, and look, she did, I was right!” Aster replied.

Emmy just groaned, and Renee stepped forwards.

“Look, ok, before we do anything, Emmy and I have some ground rules for the sword. First and foremost, no using it in this house whatsoever,” Renee started saying, but Pearl spoke up.

“Oh, no, don’t worry, mom! I was probably only gonna play around with it in my pocket space, and I was gonna keep it there too. There isn’t really the room in my room for it in my room, ya know?”

“Oh, that’s a relief.” Renee sighed.

“Pearl, why don’t you open your other gift?”

Renee’s expression brightened a bit, as did Emmy’s.

“Alright, I’m not sure how it could top a sword though.” Pearl said - but she caught herself. 

“Sorry, that was rude, wasn’t it? I didn’t mean it to be.”

“It’s alright, Pearl. C’mon, open it!” Zinnia chimed in, as she swung her legs from where she sat.

Pearl closed up the sword’s box and looked to the small envelope sitting on the table. She picked it up and examined it - it was copiously hand-decorated with markers and stickers, and signed by Renee and Emmy.

Pearl ripped open the letter to find a glittery card, and when Pearl opened it, a slip of paper fell out onto the table. Pearl put the card down and examined the paper, and she quickly realized it was a ticket - a plane ticket… to Alola.

As Pearl looked at the ticket in a state of disbelief, Renee spoke up.

“There was a promise Emmy and I made to you when you were younger, Pearl… and after a lot of discussion and planning, we’ve decided to let you go on your own adventure in Alola.” she said with a warm smile.

Pearl was speechless, and her eyes even began welling up a bit. All could do was turn around and grab her parents in a tight, teary-eyed hug.

“Thank you thank you thank you!!” Pearl said as she sunk her face into her mother’s sleeve. Emmy and Renee held Pearl about as tight as she held them, and Zinnia and Aster kept quiet as to not ruin the moment.

“An old friend of mine who lives in Alola offered to host you, and considering you have a good friend who lives in the region, Renee and I couldn’t think of a better fit.” Emmy said, amongst Pearl’s mutterings of thank you’s.

Pearl’s flight was set to depart in 4 days, so it was stressful packing everything and making sure everything was in order. Over those 4 days, Pearl had video chats with the host she was to be staying with - a woman named Melba. She also made sure to chat a bunch with the friend that her parents had brought up as their reasoning for choosing Alola, Hau. 

Hau was just as excited as Pearl was, and the two would stay up late talking about what they’d want to do once Pearl was there. Hau described the island’s trials for young adventurers with their pokemon, and all the talk made Pearl even more excited to get to Alola.

\--

It was hard to wait, but eventually, the time for Pearl to depart came. It seemed like a long drive to the airport, but it was just Pearl’s perception.

Pearl found it hard to not get teary even before the plane was called - yes, this is the thing she had wanted so desperately for years, but now that it was actually time to go, Pearl felt like clinging to her parents.

Renee and Emmy felt similarly, as it was hard to see their baby go out into the world on her own for the first time.

When the plane’s number was finally called, Pearl hugged her parents harder and longer than she’d ever hugged them before, it seemed. She told them she loved them, and with a tear-filled wave from both sides, Pearl departed onto her plane.

The plane ride to Alola was quite long, and it seems Pearl’s parents didn’t spare any expense when it came to her flight arrangements. Rather, the plane itself seemed on-par with a miniature luxury hotel.

Pearl’s chair could recline into a bed, and she was given complimentary pajamas and a sleep mask. There was sizable TV in Pearl’s cubicle as well, with a rather impressive lineup of movie titles. Pearl seemed to be the youngest passenger on the plane, but she didn’t mind. To Pearl, this was a paradise before paradise.

While on her long flight, Pearl received a video call on her laptop. She didn’t recognize the number, but figured it would be important if they decided to reach her via video.

When she picked up, Pearl could see a man in a baseball cap, who was wearing a labcoat but not a shirt.

“Hey, is this, uh, Pearl? From the Markov family?”

“Yes, that’s me! Who are you, exactly?”

“Oh, I guess I never got the time to introduce myself earlier. Name’s Professor Kukui! I’m a pokemon professor workin’ here in Alola. You’re friends with that Hau kid, right?”

“Uh huh! Why, did he tell you about me, or something?”

“His old-old man did! We’re close friends. Anyways, I apologize for such a short notice call, but I figured I’d say hi before you got on the ground. After you get settled, I’ll be the one getting you your first pokemon!”

“Oh, sweet! I think I’m actually-”

Pearl was interrupted by the dinging tone to buckle her seatbelt, as an intercom announcer stated that the plane was close to landing.

“I think I have to hang up now, but thanks for calling! I’ll be glad to see you soon!”

“Alright, cousin! Take care, and welcome to paradise!”


	2. Welcome to paradise!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> bro do i have to add a summary i cant do this. anyways pearl goes 2 alola and chooses a pokemon hell yea

Despite the comforts of the plane, Pearl felt thoroughly jetlagged once the plane had landed. She kind of had a headache, and just wanted to take a nap on the ground. 

After deboarding the plane, Pearl looked around for Melba, who had texted her that she would be waiting for her at the airport. 

“Pearl! _Pearllllll_! Over here!” a woman’s voice called out. 

Pearl looked around to try and find the source of the voice, and her eyes met with Melba’s waving arm. Pearl made sure to wave back to indicate she had seen her, and sluggishly made her way over to the woman. Melba offered Pearl a hug, but Pearl politely declined.

“How was the trip here?” Melba asked. “I can’t imagine 12 hours in a plane would be ideal even if it was some big fancy plane.”

“I’m just… tired. I feel like I could use a nice, long nap.” Pearl replied.

“Haha, well, I’ll get you out of here and home as soon as I can, then you can rest. I’ve already gotten your room ready for you so you can crash as soon as we get there!”

Pearl followed Melba through the airport, and once the two finally reached the exit, a blast of humid air hit Pearl as the doors opened in front of them. Pearl was familiar with humidity and tropical environments, as Hoenn itself was semi-tropical, but it had only now just hit Pearl that she was truly on a tropical island.

The two navigated to Melba’s car, and once Pearl got in the shotgun seat, she slumped over and pulled out her phone. As it would turn out, Pearl had a couple missed texts from her parents.

_> We miss you already, Pearls!_

_> The airline’s website said your flight just landed, hope you’re doing well!_

_> IMG_78735.JPG_

_> Someone in particular misses you a lot.._

The attached image was a picture of Izzy laying down by the front door. While she was exhausted, the picture made Pearl crack a smile.

_> >i miss you too. in the car to the new place right now_

Pearl sighed and stared out longingly at the orange sky - the sun was just beginning to set in Alola.

Melba drove just outside of Hau’oli city, and after a while, pulled her car into the garage of her house on the outskirts of the city. Pearl almost absent-mindedly got out of the car and followed Melba inside, and was greeted by Melba’s pet meowth upon entering the house. Pearl let the pokemon sniff her hand, but aside from that, she seemed too tired to interact with it much more.

Melba led pearl to her room, and Pearl took the time to examine it a bit before collapsing on the bed. She didn’t even bother to change her clothes, Pearl just laid down, got comfy, and slowly drifted off.

\--

Pearl awoke to humid air surrounding her. She was still groggy, but her headache was gone, at the very least. Pearl stretched for a bit to wake herself up, and looked out the window that sat above her new bed. She opened the window up, and stretched her arms out, taking a deep breath of the sweet summer air outside. She could smell the ocean, the trees, the flowers - all the smells seemed so intense.

This was a new world for Pearl, and it was all so vivid.

Suddenly, Pearl remembered something she had forgotten to do the night prior.

_> >hey hau!!!! i’m finally in alola!! i kind of passed out last night when i got here so i forgot to text you lol_

Pearl had to wait a bit for a response.

_> Oh nice (*°▽°*) Sorry, I’m a bit busy right now with grandpa! But we were supposed to meet with the professor later so we’ll finally be able to talk in person then!!!_

_> >that’s alright! i’ll ask the lady hosting me for more info :o i’m excited to see you soon though!!_

_> Same same! Alright sorry I gotta go now! I’ll talk to you later!!_

And with that, Pearl stretched one last time before rubbing her eyes and hopping out of bed. She checked the time on her phone to see that it was around 11am, which wasn’t the worst time to wake up.

As Pearl exited her room and entered the general living space, she could see Melba was there cooking what she presumed to be lunch.

“Goodmorning Pearl! How did you sleep?” she asked.

“Alright. Was I supposed to meet someone today?”

Melba stopped stirring and looked to Pearl for a second.

“I’ll fill you in, why don’t you sit down at the table? I’m almost done making lunch.”

So, Pearl sat down and waited in silence for a couple of minutes, scrolling through social media on her phone. Melba’s meowth came up to her, and happily accepted some pets from Pearl - it seemed to have warmed up to her fairly quickly.

Eventually, Melba set down a plate of some kind of curry in front of Pearl, and sat down with her own plate at the opposite end of the table.

“So, here’s the deal -” Melba started, taking a bite of her food before continuing. “You and your buddy were supposed to meet that Professor in about an hour and a half on Mahalo trail. You can use the map on your phone, it’s not very far from here, if you walk you should be able to get there with some time to spare.”

“Mhm…” Pearl mustered to say while chewing. 

“But when do I get my pokemon?”

“Well, I’m assuming you’ll get your pokemon once you meet the professor? He’s the one who has them after all.”

“Yea that… makes sense. Guess I gotta eat fast then!”

“Don’t rush yourself too much! You’ll be able to make it there in good time no matter what.”

Despite what Melba had said, Pearl did rush her eating a bit. She was excited to meet the Professor and Hau for the first time. She scrambled to get her bag together with all the essentials she’d need for the small hike, and just as she was about to leave for the door, Pearl got a text from Professor Kukui.

_> Heya cuz! Just texting to let you know that you might make it to Mahalo trail before me - Hau’s grandpa and I are busy with prep for a festival that’s happening later this evening, so when you get to the trail, look for a girl in a white dress and hat! She’s my assistant, and she’ll keep ya company until I get there!_

_> >alright, thank you!_

With a confident huff, Pearl said goodbye to Melba and opened the door to her brand new world. It took Pearl a little while to find the trail to Iki town, but once she found it, things were pretty straight forward until she hit town. 

Once Pearl was in Iki town, she was almost constantly staring down at her map to try and figure out where to go. Eventually, Pearl made it to the trail, but there was no one to be seen, much less a girl with a white dress and hat. So, Pearl waited on a bench in the hot summer sun, waiting for someone to come.

Whether it was curiosity of the beckoning shade of the trail, Pearl sighed and got up. She looked around, to confirm that nobody was there, and started to make her way down the trail.

The trail was cooler than the parking lot in front of it, thanks in due part to the heavy foliage overhead. Bird pokemon were singing loudly, and the entire area smelled earthy.

After walking for some time, Pearl eventually came across a clearing with a bridge connecting two sides between a river. She also quickly spotted the girl she was told to look for - white hat, white dress, and squatted on the ground; her arms outstretched and beckoning to what looked like a pokemon on the rickety old bridge.

Was it a pokemon though…? It didn’t look like anything Pearl had seen or heard of before. 

Pearl called out and waved to the girl, who turned to Pearl nervously, but didn’t give a response. Pearl looked closer at the situation and could see that a trio of spearow were tormenting and striking the creature on the bridge. Pearl assumed the girl was afraid of the pokemon, so Pearl walked up to her.

“Don’t worry, I’ve got this!” she said, and before the girl in white could protest, Pearl started making her way across the old, rickety bridge. She held her arms out at her sides to try and keep balance, and was easily able to scoop up the weakened and scared pokemon in the middle of the bridge.

But as the weight of the two settled in one place, Pearl heard a snap and a yell from the girl behind her, and her heart dropped.

The rotting bridge had snapped.

Soon enough, Pearl and the pokemon she was holding began plummeting towards the rapids below them, and as much as Pearl kept telling herself to just teleport out of this, she couldn’t concentrate the focus to do it. She kept bracing herself for the shock of hitting the water, but it never came.

All of a sudden, Pearl could feel herself being carried - though she was still too afraid to open her eyes. In no time at all, Pearl and the pokemon she was holding were set down gently on the grass where the girl in white had been standing in a panic. Pearl opened her eyes, and the only glimpse she got of whatever rescued her was a blurred electric shape as it dashed away.

“Are you okay?!” the girl in white gasped out as she ran towards Pearl.

The strange pokemon Pearl had rescued on the bridge squirmed out of her arms and bounced towards the girl happily, and the girl just sighed and gave it a pat on the head.

The girl and Pearl just stared at each other for a couple of seconds before Pearl spoke up.

“Yea I’m… alright? That was wild, huh?” Pearl said, but the girl in white didn’t respond. Pearl had trouble making eye contact, so she looked to the ground as she spoke.

“Uh… my name’s Pearl! Are you by chance Professor Kukui’s assistant? Why weren’t you at the meeting spot?”

The girl had a blank expression before her thoughts came back to her.

“Sorry…! My friend Nebby escaped from me and I couldn’t just let them out in the open… but you saw what happened… I’m sorry.” the girl paused and adjusted her hat.

“My name’s Lillie. I’m sorry that you nearly…”

“ _Died?_ Yea, well, hey! It’s alright now, no need to keep apologizing! I would’ve been able to get myself out of it anyways.” Pearl replied.

“What do you mean?? How could anyone save themselves from a situation like that?”

Pearl remembered she wasn’t necessarily supposed to disclose she had powers to strangers.

“It’s… a long story. Anyways, what _WAS_ that thing? And more importantly, what _IS_ Nebby? I’ve never seen a pokemon like that before in my life!”

Lillie looked a bit nervous and didn’t respond right away. She instead kneeled to the ground and unzipped her pokeball-motif bag and beckoned for Nebby to hop inside. Nebby seemed reluctant at first, but quickly hopped inside the bag with a _‘pew_ _’_ noise. 

“I… don’t quite know what that thing that rescued you was… but Nebby is a special pokemon. Don’t tell anyone you saw them, alright?” Lillie replied, standing back up.

“Okie-dokie, whatever you say. The professor is probably waiting for us, we should get go-” Pearl’s words trailed off as she noticed something glittering in the grass.

“What is it?” Lillie asked.

Pearl picked up the object and examined it. It was a reflective white rock that sparkled many colors in the sunlight.

“It’s a fancy rock… type of thing my uncle would like. We can keep moving! I’ll just put this in my bag.” Pearl said as she dusted herself off. 

Lillie nodded, and the two headed down the trail back to where they had come from.

A few minutes into the walk back, the pair saw a man and a lab coat and someone Pearl could indistinguishably identify as Hau. Once Pearl saw him, a huge smile spread across her face as she called out his name and ran towards him.

The two friends met in a hug, for after knowing each other for two years, they finally met in person. 

The two were talking over each other in a muddled mess of words, describing what had happened to them while they were out for the day. Hau talked about how he was helping his grandfather out for preparations for a festival later that evening, while Pearl went on about her encounter on the bridge.

After some moments of spilling words, the man in the lab coat interrupted the two by offering his hand to Pearl - and after a moment of looking at his face, Pearl was able to tell that it was Kukui.

“Hey, Pearl! Pleasure to meet ya in the flesh!” he said as he shook Pearl’s hand.

“I see you’ve met my assistant, Lillie, too! Right on! Since we’ve already got out introductions done, why don’t you two follow me on down to Iki town’s plaza and we can get on with the opening ceremony!”

Pearl cocked her head a bit.

“Opening ceremony for _what_?” she asked.

“It’s for the festival me n’ Grandpa were prepping for! A buncha new trainers get their first pokemon and battle each other!” Hau spoke up.

“He’s right - it’s an awful nice coincidence the time you left for Alola coincided with Iki town’s summer festival of battles. It also marks the start of the season for the island trials!” Kukui said.

“Island trials? Like Hau mentioned? Hold on, I’m a bit confused, everything’s kind of being thrown at me all at once.” Pearl said, shaking her head a bit.

Kukui put his hands on his hips.

“It’s alright! Everything will be explained when it has it’s time. In the meantime, let’s get ourselves moving on to Iki town so we can get you two a pokemon!”

Hau happily exclaimed, and the group began moving back towards the town’s plaza. Pearl noticed Lillie had been awfully quiet the entire time and tried to strike up a conversation with her on the way back, but she only seemed to give one-word replies.

It was crowded at the plaza, but Kukui helped Pearl and Hau find their way to where they needed to be while Lillie sat behind at some bleachers to watch.

That’s when Pearl met Hau’s grandfather - Hala.

“Oi, Kukui!” he called out, waving his hand from among the crowd. The old man spoke with a gruff but kind voice, and smiled when he saw Pearl and Hau.

“Ah, you must be Pearl that I’ve heard so much about! It's a pleasure to finally meet you in person.”

“It’s nice to meet you too! I’ve heard a lot about you too, yea.”

“Haha, hope Hau hasn’t been too harsh on me!” Hala paused and flipped through some papers on a clipboard he was holding.

“Say, if you wanted to get your pokemon first, you could sign up as Hau’s battle rival! What do you say, Pearl?”

“Yeah!! We should totally be rivals, Pearl!” Hau said, striking a sort of pose.

“Well… doesn’t ‘rivals’ sound a bit harsh?” Pearl replied.

“Well, not to me. Rivals don’t always have to hate each other like in anime! We can be… friendly rivals! And watch each other grow!”

“When you put it that way, I really can’t NOT sign up. Hand me that clipboard, Hala!”

Hala smiled and handed Pearl the clipboard, where she signed her name next to Hau’s. In the moments that followed, she impatiently waited for the moment that Hau and herself were to be called up. The anticipation seemed to be high all around her too - as the fellow trainers about to get their first pokemon as well were jittering with excitement.

Eventually, Pearl and Hau’s names were called, and while she was nervous about being in front of a crowd of strangers, Hau assured her she’d do great.

Pearl and Hau stood side-by-side as Kukui greeted them once more.

“Alright, I got three special pokemon for you to pick from! Go on, take your pick!”

As he finished speaking, Kukui tossed 3 pokeballs in the air, which popped open to reveal 3 pokemon;

_Rowlet, the grass quill pokemon!_

_Litten, the fire cat pokemon!_

_And Popplio, the sea lion pokemon!_

Pearl and Hau’s eyes were full of sparkles. There they were - 3 adorable pokemon, and one of them was going home with them. Pearl’s eye’s met with the popplio’s, and in that moment, she felt like it was fate.

Pearl let the popplio sniff her hand, and when it showed it was comfortable with Pearl, she picked it up from under the flippers and lifted it up in the air. The popplio playfully smiled, and Pearl did as well.

“Wow, looks like you already found your soul pokemon!” Hau said, smiling.

“Hmm… I dunno, I’m pretty torn, but I think I’ll have to go with… you! Litten!”

Hau picked up the kitten pokemon and scritched behind its ears, causing it to purr in delight. 

Kukui recalled the remaining pokemon to it’s pokeball, and handed Pearl and Hau each their respective balls.

“Congratulations, cousin! You’re now officially a pokemon trainer as of today! With that, why don’t you two feel like having your very first pokemon battle?” he said.

Hau and Pearl didn’t exchange any words, they simply smiled at each other and nodded. The two stepped up onto the battle platform in the plaza on opposite sides.

As soon as Hala called the start of the match, Pearl quickly called for her Popplio to use water gun on Hau’s litten. She had been practicing this moment in her head for years, and she felt like she knew exactly what to do.

Since both pokemon were so weak, the battle didn’t last very long - Pearl’s popplio was easily able to K.O. Hau’s litten, thanks to type advantages. Still, it was exhilarating for both parties, and when Hala called Pearl as the winner, both Pearl and Hau couldn’t help but have huge grins on their faces.

After the battle, the two went to a kiosk to get their trainer cards printed, and both of them made the biggest smiles for their pictures - Pearl even held up her new pokemon for the camera.

After leaving the kiosk, the two were approached by Kukui and Lillie.

“Pearl! Hau! That was amazing, you both did so well for your first time battling!” he said, giving a thumbs-up.

“Thanks prof! Even if I did lose, it was still pretty fun!” Hau said, putting his hands up behind his head in a comfortable position, while his healed litten was purring and rubbing at his leg.

Lillie peeked from behind Kukui to speak.

“It was short, but I thought it was a good battle too. I could really see the both of you give it your all.” she said quietly.

The group talked some more before Pearl checked the time and realized she should probably head back home. 

“Awh, I wanted to show you the best malasada place in town - I think it’s still open!” Hau said.

“It’s fine, you can show me later! Plus, I’m tired and all sweaty, it’d be nice to get home and rest.” Pearl replied. 

“Alright! How about we meet at that malasada shop tomorrow to talk about the island trials? I can text you the location and time.”

“That sounds good! Alright, I’m off, I’ll seeya tomorrow!”

With that, Pearl walked backwards while waving before turning around and heading back home.

\--

Pearl was laying on her bed, mindlessly scrolling through social media before she went to bed. Her popplio was at the foot of her bed, and every so often, Pearl would fix her posture to reach the pokemon and pet it.

“I should name you…” Pearl whispered to herself. “How about Azul? That’s a cute name for a cute pokemon… yea… Azul works.”


	3. The first trial

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> this based on an actual real battle with totem raticate. godspeed

Pearl awoke the next day to Azul nudging her with his nose. 

“Fine… what, I’m awake…” Pearl muttered to herself, sleepily. 

She flailed her arms around in front of her haphazardly, in an attempt to find her phone on the bedside table. At first her hand landed on Azul’s head, and she made sure to give him a good pet. Pearl lifted herself up and sat on her bed, where she reached to grab her phone.

She had a couple of text notifications, all of them were from her parents.

_‘Crap’_ Pearl thought, as she remembered she had forgotten to text them at all about the events of the night prior.

Pearl opened her messages.

>Pearls? You there? It’s around 9pm for you now, hope you don’t mind us saying goodnight!

>Goodnight Pearl! We think you’re a superstar!

[...]

>Goodmorning Pearl! It’s getting a bit late here but we both hope you have an exciting day!

>Emmy is already asleep but she says good morning as well!

Pearl went to reply.

>>hey, sorry, i had a busy day yesterday and kind of passed out.

>>i got my first pokemon though! meet azul!

>>IMG_34098.JPG

The attachment was a picture Pearl had taken of Azul with his snout up against her phone’s camera.

>Aww! Very cute! Make sure to give him lots of love for me. It’ll be exciting to watch you two grow together!

>Alright, it is pretty late here, I should be going to bed soon too. Have a good day and remember to take care of yourself

>>i will! love you mom!

Pearl put her phone down and sighed, looking up at the ceiling. From the looks of it, Pearl had a long day ahead of her. 

She looked back at her phone to check the time and jumped with a muffled ‘ _oh shit!_ ’ - it was 9:34am, and Pearl was supposed to meet Hau for malasadas at 10.

She pushed herself off of her bed and quickly went to get ready for the day, Azul flopping behind her.

Once Pearl was ready, she picked up Azul and carried him under her arm, and was ready to head out the door, until…

“Oh, good morning Pearl! Where are you going in such a hurry?” Melba asked, as she sat on the couch watching TV.

“Sorry, can’t really stop to talk - I’m meeting Hau for breakfast!” Pearl said as she rushed out the door.

“So busy and so many places to be, my goodness.” Melba said, watching Pearl leave out from out the window. 

  
  


Pearl’s pace was that of a slow jog, as she tried to go as fast as she could while combating the humid summer air. She made it to Iki town in good time, but got lost trying to find the malasada shop - eventually resorting to using the map app on her phone.

She eventually made it to the small store, where Hau was sitting inside right next to the front window. He saw Pearl and waved, and as Pearl entered the shop, a small jingle rang out as she opened the door.

“Hey Pearl! Did you oversleep?”

“...Maybe!” Pearl said as she caught her breath from running and pulled out a chair to sit down on.

“But that’s excusable, right? Yesterday was real busy, after all.”

“Haha, yea, I guess. Speaking of which, I wanted to talk about the island trials more, if you’d be down. I got the info pulled up right now!” Hau said, tapping at his phone.

“Yeah, I had a question about that… when I went to the website all the photos they had were of little kids, are you sure we aren’t like, too old or something?”

Hau gave Pearl a bit of a confused look.

“No, not at all! It’s for anyone 10 to 17, I think they just use pics of kids to help get more younger people into it.”

“Ohh, okay, that makes sense. Yea, you can go on about them, I’m interested in hearing what we have to do next!”

Hau opened his mouth to speak, but was interrupted by the barista at the counter calling his name. He gestured to Pearl that it’d be a second, and got up to grab three large malasadas and a juice.

He sat back down with Pearl and handed her a malasada.

“You got yourself two?” Pearl asked as Hau quickly bit into his first malasada.

Hau signaled that he was going to finish chewing before speaking, then he spoke up.

“Hey, don’t judge me! These are like, the best malasadas in the whole world!”

“Fair enough, I’ll have to try this one then.” After she finished speaking, Pearl went and took a bite, and she nodded her head.

“Hey, this is really good! Alright, let’s hear it about the trials.”

Hau took another bite and waited until he was done chewing to talk.

“Alright, so basically, Alola is made up of four islands, right? And each island has a Kahuna that keeps trials there running smoothly. But to challenge the Kahuna, you gotta complete the island’s trials first.” 

Hau paused to take another bite, crumbs falling onto the table.

“Each island has a different amount of trials… Melemele has… only one, if I recall right. Oh, oh, and each trial has a trial captain! We should see Melemele’s trial captain if we wanna get started!”

“Neat! Do you know who it is at all?” Pearl asked.

“No… but I assume Professor Kukui can tell us! Though he hasn’t replied to any of my texts in a while, I wonder if he could be sleeping in too…”

Suddenly, someone burst into the store - and it was someone Pearl and Hau recognized - it was Lillie.

She ran in front of Pearl and Hau’s table and started huffing as she caught her breath.

“Woah, Lillie, where’d you come from?” Hau asked, giving her some time to respond.

“The professor’s… internet… went out…” Lillie said in-between breaths.

After a moment, Lillie finally gathered herself and sat down.

“So he sent me to tell you that Melemele’s trial captain, Ilima, is out painting a fence near the marina in Hau’oli! Now would be a good time to head over there to see if you can catch him!”

“Like, right now?” Pearl asked.

“Yes, right now! His internet went out only a couple of minutes after Ilima told him that he was ready to have any trial-goers sent his way.”

“Well, I guess we should get going, Pearl! We can probably make it to the bus in good time if we leave right now.” Hau said.

“Wait!” Lillie said, urgency in her voice. “Can I, uh… come with you two? I don’t get the chance to get out of the house much, and the way you two battled yesterday… I’m still thinking about it! So… would it be okay if I tagged along?” 

“What, of course you can come along! Give me a sec to finish this malasada and we can get going!” Pearl replied. 

Hau looked down at his remaining malasada, before grabbing it and getting out of his chair. Then, he handed it to Lillie with a smile.

“Is it really alright if I have this?” she asked.

“Yeah, of course! It’ll be nice to have a snack as we walk!”

Hesitantly, Lillie grabbed the malasada, with a bit of a confused look on her face - but after taking a bite she did her best to smile back at Hau.

With that, the three were off to the bus stop that ran between Iki town and Hau’oli city, since the two were so close in proximity. The three got on the bus, with Pearl sitting in between Hau and Lillie.

Lillie was slightly more talkative this time around, though it was clear to Pearl she was still rather anxious in general. 

As the bus passed a building in the outskirts of Hau’oli, Lillie pointed it out.

“That’s the trainer’s school, where Ilima usually works. I thought you two would want to stop there…? They teach a lot of useful information about pokemon battling.”

“Psh, nah, I’m goin’ straight to Ilima! I’ve been doing research into battling for years! Plus, my mom’s one of the best trainers in the whole entire world, and I got to go to work with her when I was a kid!” Pearl said, looking a bit smug.

“W… wow, really? It’s amazing to have a mom like that… even letting you into her work…”

Lillie’s words trailed off a bit, as she looked distracted while speaking. Pearl thought it was odd, but didn’t think much of it. The three were mostly quiet for the rest of the ride, until they got off at the Marina’s bus stop. Pearl scooped Azul up, and the three were off.

Once they arrived, the trio was able to find a fence with fresh paint, a trail which they followed until they came across a pink-haired teenager with a smeargle, who only seemed a couple of years older than her. The two were standing next to a spilled bucket of paint, and two men dressed in black in white were wildly gesturing towards him.

“You weirdos get nothing done - look at all the paint you’ve wasted!” the young man with the smeargle said, a look of disgust on his face.

“Yo yo, it’s not our fault you’re the trial captain! We wouldn’t be messin’ with you if you weren’t such a prep!” one of the two men said.

The young man noticed Pearl, Hau, and Lillie standing in the background and waved to them.

“Hey, you! Are you trainers? Could I have a little help here?”

The two men stopped gesturing and turned towards Pearl.

“Hey, yo, don’t get in our way! We’re team skull, and this is our biz only, so stay out of it!”

Pearl looked to Hau with a confidently smug look on her face. She knew of the past, and how young trainers had stopped troublemakers and criminals with a pokemon battle, and right now, her mind was rushing with the thoughts of taking the two men down.

“You wanna take em?” Pearl said, and as she spoke, Hau reached for his belt to grab his pokeball.

“Heck yea, let's do this!”

The two men in skull masks looked shocked.

“Hey now! Don’t go ruining our mojo! We’ll pound you kids into the ground like there’s no tomorrow, yo!” said the other man, and both men reached and grabbed pokeballs of their own.

Pearl let Azul down onto the ground, and Hau let out his litten. The two skull-masked men each released their own zubat.

Lillie stepped back as the battle commenced, and just as her last battle had gone, Pearl yelled out her first attack with a tone that exuded confidence.

“Azul, water gun, let’s go!” 

“Hit the other one with an ember, litten!” Hau quickly followed.

The two had very good sync with each other, which left the opposing men bumbling over their commands after the swift attacks.

After a couple of turns, it was over. The two skull-masked men recalled their fainted zubats and rescinded in defeat.

“Mark my words, yo! You kids might have gotten us this time, but this won’t be the last you’ll see of Team Skull!” said one of the men. As that was said, both of them did a pose and did a sort of dance off into the distance.

“Team Skull…? Those guys just seemed like some mean weirdos.” Pearl said, going to pick up Azul to dust him off.

“Ohh, that explains it! Yea, no, Team Skull is a group of hooligans that likes to mess with the island trials. Grampa’s had trouble with ‘em before, but they’re mostly harmless. Those zubats went down quick - they weren’t any match for the both of us!” Hau replied, recalling his litten back to its pokeball after giving it a hearty victory pet.

“Hey, you two!” a voice called out. It was the pink-haired painter with the smeargle, who had propped his paint can back up again. 

“That was a good battle! Thanks for taking care of that for me - normally I’d deal with them myself, but smeargle here got too upset over the spilled paint to be able to battle.”

He extended his hand out to shake Pearl’s.

“The name’s Ilima! I’m assuming you two came at the professor’s word that I was here, no?”

“Yup, that’s why we’re here, all thanks to our friend Lillie!” Hau said, as Lillie meeped and covered her face with her hat.

“Haha, well, unfortunately I can’t help you right now - I gotta clean up this mess those Skull grunts made. But if you give me your number, I can text you two when… oh?” Ilima stopped talking, noticing his smeargle was tugging at his pant leg. The pokemon stopped once Ilima noticed, and pointed up at Azul.

“Oh, well, it looks like someone was definitely enthralled by your battle - I think smeargle wants to battle with you - oh, what was your name again, I don’t think I ever got it.”

“Pearl! My name’s Pearl.” she said. “If I win against you, can we go do the trial now?”

Ilima thought for a second.

“Eh, sure, why not? A wins a win, after all.”

Ilima’s hand went to his belt, where he revealed a second pokeball. 

“I’m a normal-type specialist, so unless you have any fighting types, we’re on a neutral playing field here”

“Azul here is my only pokemon…” Pearl said.

“Well, I guess that makes this a two-on-one - hope you’re ready for it!” Ilima said, shortly after he spoke, he released a yungoos from it’s pokeball.

Since it was the weaker of Ilima’s pokemon, Pearl knocked it out fairly quickly without taking much damage on Azul’s side. 

“Good job! But how do you think you can handle… this! Smeargle, get out there!”

Smeargle moved from standing behind Ilima, and bumbled into the field. 

Pearl still had a smug confidence in herself, and was about to call out her command to Azul, but Ilima spoke first.

“Leafage.”

It was a quick and swift command, and it seemed instant from the moment the leaves hit Azul to the moment Azul fainted.

Pearl was out of usable pokemon. She had lost.

Pearl stood by with a shocked look on her face, trying to properly process what had happened. She had gotten so full of herself that she couldn’t quite fathom the idea of losing. 

‘ _But I’ve studied so much, it’s impossible…_ ’ she thought, as she ran towards Azul and scooped him up, recalling him to his pokeball once he was in her arms.

“Hey, don’t sweat it. You’re a new trainer, right? You’re gonna lose all the time once you’re out there, it’s no big deal.” Ilima said, giving his smeargle a pat on the head.

But to Pearl, it was a big deal, even if it was so small. Her lip was quivering, but she didn’t want to come across as a sore loser, when really, she was. She had never lost before - she wasn’t quite sure how she was supposed to react. 

“I… think I need to head to the Pokecenter. I’ll… catch up with you later, Hau.” Pearl said, as she started to walk away.

“Er, ok Pearl! Me and Lillie will catch you later, I guess?”

  
  


The Pokemon Center was moderately crowded, being that it was the peak of the day. Still, Pearl didn’t have to wait long to heal her fainted pokemon. The nurse who took her pokeball noticed she looked upset, and tried to make some smalltalk as the Center’s machine did it’s job.

“Hard loss, huh?”

Pearl didn’t reply, and only glanced to the side.

“It’s ok, there’s always next time! We’ll have your pokemon raring to go again in just a second. If you’re looking to train, Route 2 is the best training ground around, it’s just to the north of the city.”

As the nurse finished speaking, the healing machine beeped to indicate it was finished, and the nurse turned to grab Azul’s pokeball and handed it to Pearl.

“Say, you only have one pokemon, why don’t you take advantage of a promotion we have going on right now? New trainers can get 5 pokeballs for free, just take this coupon to the Pokemart over there!”

Pearl simply nodded and thanked the nurse, and walked over through the busy Center to the Pokemart portion of the building. There, just as the nurse had advised, Pearl exchanged the coupon for 5 free pokeballs, which she stuffed in her bag. Pearl left the center swiftly after that, and checked the map on her phone for the location of Route 2.

It would only be a short walk away, so Pearl made her way through Hau’oli’s downtown portion to the more open and grassy Route 2. 

There, Pearl hiked around, battling wild pokemon and a few trainers - whom she won against. The wins helped calm her sour mood a bit, but Pearl remained frustrated with herself.

As she continued to wander, Pearl noticed that she had stumbled across a graveyard, though there were few people there. She made sure to tread carefully while looking for pokemon. 

After a few moments, Pearl felt something bump into her from behind - she slowly turned around, expecting to be spooked by a gutsy ghost pokemon that was out during the day. But to Pearl’s surprise, it was a cute drifloon.

“Aww, look at you!” Pearl said as she grabbed the balloon pokemon’s strings, almost by instinct. The pokemon tried to pull Pearl up, but was too weak to do so. Pearl just thought it was cute, and laughed. 

Then, a bright idea hit her. This cute ghost would make the perfect teammate!

Pearl sent Azul out from his pokeball and instructed him to use water gun on the balloon pokemon. 

Instead of running away, and drifloon seemed to become engaged in the battle, as Pearl whittled down it’s HP to a level she was confident in. Then, she readied one of the pokeballs she had gotten from the Pokemart and entered a confident stance - and threw it at the drifloon.

_1… 2… 3… click_! Drifloon was caught!

Pearl recalled Azul back to his pokeball and picked her newly-caught pokemon’s pokeball off the ground. With a gentle tap of the ball’s button, Pearl released her new drifloon from the ball and grabbed it’s strings again.

Instead of trying to tug her off, the drifloon looked to Pearl with a sense of trust after she had bested it in battle. Pearl smiled at it.

“I think I’ll name you… Poppy! A cute name for a cute pokemon!” she said, as she wrapped the ghost’s string around her finger, as to make sure it’d stay with her.

Poppy looked pleased with its new name, and followed Pearl along as she left the graveyard.

As Pearl was walking along Route 2, she found a rest stop motel where she stopped to get some water and sit down. As she was resting, she could feel her phone buzz in her back pocket, so she grabbed it.

_> Hey Pearl? You doin better?_

_> >yea. i think i’ve cooled my head enough… i kinda overreacted i guess (￣□￣」)_

_> I understand, I was frustrated when I lost my very first battle but what matters in the end was that I had fun!_

_> >i guess i need to focus on that aspect more.. idk i think it comes from my mom. grandma jokes about her being a really sore loser lol_

_> Maybe that could be it 🤔_

_> But I wanted to say I finished Ilima’s trial and he said he’d be glad to let you take it! It’s down by verdant cavern which is across from the pokecenter on route 2!_

_> >oh wow, i’m already on route 2 so i guess i’ll head that way!_

_> Oh, sweet! You probs won’t see me there because I was gonna head back home and chill, and Lillie’s doing some exploring on her own._

_> alright, cool! i’ll see you later then!_

Pearl put her phone back in her back pocket and patted the tuft on Poppy’s head. After she had significantly rested her legs, Pearl jumped back up and looked at the map provided in the rest stop - it wouldn’t be too long of a walk until she hit Verdant Cavern. 

She left the rest stop feeling refreshed and ready to go.

During the walk, Pearl was talking to Poppy a bit.

“So… if Ilima is a normal-type trainer, that means that this trial is likely gonna be normal types, yea? And that’s why you’re perfect for the job, Poppy! He won’t know what hit ‘em!”

  
  


After about 15 minutes of walking, Pearl could see Ilima standing out front of a cavern moderately covered by vegetation. Pearl waved with her free arm to him, and he just put his hand up to indicate he had seen Pearl.

Pearl ran over to Ilima, and Ilima was quick to notice Poppy, who was still being held by Pearl.

“Got a new friend, huh?” he said, gesturing at Poppy.

“Yup! I feel like I’m ready to take on the trial now!”

“Well, that’s good news! I just finished re-setting the place, so you’re welcome to start now if you’d like. Oh, first, let me go over the terms of the trials here - do you know them already?”

“Nope! I wasn’t aware there were terms at all.”

“Well, there’s really only two. First, you can’t leave the trial area once the trial starts unless all your pokemon faint or you give up. Second, once you complete the trial you have to battle… a _special pokemon_.”

“What do you mean by ‘special pokemon’?” Pearl asked, cocking her head.

“Well, it’s a larger-than-normal pokemon called a totem pokemon that’s extra strong. But I feel you’ll have no problem! Hau told me all about how much you care about battling and your pokemon, I’m confident that you’ll be able to do this.” Ilima said, turning towards the entrance of the cavern.

“So, what do you think? Wanna give it a shot right now?”

“You bet I do!” Pearl said as she got into a confident stance.

Ilima nodded and gestured for Pearl to follow him into the cavern, which she did. Once inside, Ilima explained what Pearl was to do.

“Since this is the first trial, it’s not too tricky. I’ve hid two pokemon treats in the holes around this cavern! They’re marked, so they shouldn’t be hard to miss. Your job is to retrieve those treats to lure the totem pokemon down! But he warned, there’s some Alolan rattata guarding them, and you’ll have to defeat them to get to the treats.” Ilima explained.

Pearl nodded her head along with Ilima’s explanation.

“Uh-huh, got it. Can we get on with the trial?” she said.

“Haha, you sure are eager to get started, huh? Alright, you’re free to go ahead! I’ll be waiting here at the cavern entrance in case you wanna go back.”

And with that, Pearl’s first island trial officially started.

Pearl was quick to find the first marked hole, but there was nothing inside. As she looked around a bit more, she could see another marked hole, this time with some skittering noises being heard from within. 

As she approached the hole, an aggressive Alolan rattata jumped out at her!

Pearl was a bit off-put by its appearance - because while she knew regional variants existed, she wasn’t quite sure what they had looked like until now.

Still, Pearl untangled Poppy’s strings from her wrist and commanded her pokemon use gust against the rattata.

It didn’t do much damage, but Pearl quickly realized - the rat pokemon could do nothing to hit Poppy. All of it’s attacks must’ve been normal-type attacks, because none of them affected Poppy whatsoever. 

Even with the little damage that gust did, it was still a completely one sided battle, as the rattata couldn’t do anything. 

Pearl won against the rattata, and retrieved the treat from the hole. And so, Pearl went to investigate the other holes. It took a couple of holes until Pearl found the one the rattata was hiding in, and it was largely the same battle she had with the previous one.

Without breaking a sweat, Pearl moved on deeper into the cavern, and entered a dead-end bathed in sunlight. Poppy was cautious, and Pearl could feel it too - something was watching them. Pearl left the treats out on the ground and waited.

Suddenly, Pearl could hear scuffling and rocks falling around the cavern, and in an instant, a huge mass jumped overhead of Pearl and landed right in front of the treats. It was a massive Alolan raticate, and it was hastily stuffing the small in comparison treats in it’s mouth. It turned to notice Pearl and Poppy and hissed, causing the two of them to get into a battle stance. 

Pearl called out her move to Poppy - gust, again. It’s not like Pearl had any other moves she could call to it, as all of Poppy’s other moves were ghost-type and would have no effect.

The gust did a minimal amount of damage, and Pearl was expecting the worst for Poppy - likely a bite attack.

But to Pearl’s surprise, that bite attack never came. The huge raticate just tried and failed to tackle Poppy, who just gently bounced off the rat.

_The raticate only knew normal-type attacks._

A glint shone in Pearl’s eyes, and she commanded Poppy to keep using gust. Gust after gust, the raticate’s HP slowly dwindled, and eventually, out of energy to fight, it fled back into the depths of the cavern.

Pearl jumped in victory and gave Poppy a big hug, and the two exited the cavern together.


	4. Hala

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> this was originally gonna be a part of the previous chapter but i split it for length

As Pearl exited the cavern Ilima was softly clapping for her when she approached.

“Congratulations! That was quite the strategy to use a ghost-type pokemon, if I’ve ever seen one.” he said.

“So, what now?” Pearl asked in reply.

“Well, do you have your trainer’s passport you were given when you signed up? I’ll stamp it for you showing that you’ve cleared Melemele’s trial! Then, you can challenge the Kahuna!”

“Oh, here, lemme get it out of my bag…” Pearl said as she rustled around in her bag, pulling out her trainer’s passport and allowing Ilima to stamp it.

“Who do you mean by Kahuna, again?”

“Oh, I believe you’ve already met him! The Kahuna of Melemele island is Hala, Hau’s grandfather.”

“Ohhh, that makes sense!” Pearl said, tapping her chin.

“Well, thanks Ilima! I’m gonna go ahead and text the professor now and hope his internet is working again for more information.”

“Alright! It was nice meeting you, Pearl. I’ll see you around, I guess!”

Pearl recalled Poppy to its pokeball, and made her way to the Pokemon Center across the way from the trial site to text Kukui about the trial.

_> >heya! I completed ilima’s trial!!_

_> Oh, that’s good news, cuz! I think ol’ Hala’s tied up with battles tonight but I know he’ll definitely be free to battle you tomorrow!_

_> On that note, you’re on Route 2 and free right now, Right Pearl?_

_> >mhm, that i am_

_> Okay, good! Because I have a little favor to ask of you…_

_> Lillie’s ran into a bit of trouble and she needs someone to help her. Hau’s already at home so I figured you were closer._

_> >oh, yea, it’s no problem! where is she?_

_> She’s in Melemele meadow - I’ll send you the directions but if you go up past Route 3 and follow signs you should be able to find your way there fairly easily!_

_> >alright, gotcha! i’ll do what i can!!_

Pearl exited her messaging app and took a look at the map Kukui had sent - it was another 15 or so minute walk to Melemele meadow, but even then, Pearl worried if she would be able to make it there in time. Still, she went to hike the trail up to Route 3.

She spent the walk worrying about Lillie, as she hadn’t really been told what was wrong and how time-sensitive it was.

Pearl arrived at the stone arch that separated the meadow from the rocky and dusty Route 3 - it seemed like it was connected to the open-ceiling cave system that Verdant Cavern was a part of.

It wasn't a very large meadow, and Lillie’s pure white outfit stood out like a sore thumb. Pearl called out and waved to Lillie, who turned to Pearl while clutching her bag.

As Pearl approached Lillie, she could see that the girl was obviously shaken, and her bag was unzipped.

“Pearl…! Did the professor tell you I was here?” Lillie asked.

“Yea, he said you were in trouble! What’s up, is… Nebby gone again?” Pearl replied as she peered inside Lillie’s clearly empty bag.

“Oh, it’s awful - they wouldn’t stop fussing so I decided to let them out for just a quick bit, but next thing I know they’re all the way across the field! I didn’t mean for this to happen…”

“Of course you didn’t! Nebby just seems… rambunctious, is all. Do you know where they went?”

Lillie pointed towards the opposite end of the field, and directed Pearl’s eyes to a bush of flowers.

“Nebby got chased by some cutiefly and has been hiding in that flower bush ever since. I’m too scared to go out into the tall flowers without a pokemon… that’s why I hoped you could help.”

“Psh, I can do it no problem! I just need to watch to make sure I don’t step on something, but of course I can grab Nebby for you!”

“Oh, thank you so much! I’m sorry for causing you the trouble…”

“No, no, it’s fine! No need to apologize.”

Pearl carefully stepped down into the bed of yellow flowers and began carefully stepping through them, making sure to look down to the ground and around her for possible pokemon that could be disturbed. 

It took Pearl a couple of minutes to creep her way through the flowers, but she was able to make it to the other side of the field without angering any of the small pokemon that lived among the flowers.

She crouched down and looked into the bush where Nebby was supposedly hiding, and Nebby carefully came out of the bush.

This was the first time Pearl had gotten a real good look at Nebby’s face, and as she examined it, she only became more perplexed.

They didn’t look like anything of this world - their body seemed to look like it contained the cosmos itself and their eyes seemed to shine as bright as stars. She couldn’t wonder any longer - Pearl had to know what Nebby was.

Pearl was able to scoop up Nebby, as they didn’t seem to protest, and she focused her mind on the other side of the field. She channeled all her energy into focusing on a singular area, right next to Lillie. Then, she let go, and poof! She was on the other side of the meadow without having to painstakingly navigate back.

_...Wait_. 

_Lillie was there_. Pearl had let the thought of getting to the other side more quickly overshadow the fact that nobody was supposed to know about her powers. 

_Shit_ ; Pearl thought.

Pearl’s mind was racing with what to say to Lillie, and she didn’t want to open her eyes to face her. But before she should say anything, Lillie spoke.

“Oh Nebby…!! You’re telling me you could’ve teleported back this entire time?! That’s it, you’re going in the bag and you’re NOT coming out until we get home!” Lillie said, grabbing the creature and placing it gently in her bag and zipping it up.

“Wait… what?” Pearl said in astonishment, confused as to Lillie’s reaction. She had expected something more along the lines of Lillie freaking out.

“I’m sorry Pearl, that must’ve felt weird - Nebby can teleport short distances and take others with them, they’ve done it with me before but they’re very finicky about it…”

“I… wuh… yeah. I guess that’s… what happened.” Pearl replied, trying her best to feign confusion - Lillie must’ve thought it was Nebby that teleported the both of them, not Pearl.

“You okay, Pearl? You sound disoriented.”

“Yeah, I’m… fine.” Pearl sighed. It felt like she had just dodged a bullet.

“Hey, can I ask you something?”

Lillie looked at Pearl strangely.

“What is it? I was planning on heading back home, so we can walk and talk.”

“Sure, that sounds good, I needed to talk to the professor anyways!”

So, the two of them began their hike down the mountain to Professor Kukui’s house. There, Pearl straightforwardly asked Lillie about Nebby - what they were and where they were from. The question caused Lillie to tense up a bit, like it had the last time, and she didn’t necessarily give a straightforward answer.

She had told Pearl not to tell anyone, and confirmed Pearl’s suspicions; that Nebby was indeed an extraterrestrial, though Lillie wouldn’t disclose where they were from, saying that she didn’t know. Lillie also said that she didn’t quite know what Nebby was, either, she just knew that they weren’t a pokemon.

The two moved on in terms of conversation and chatted all the way down the mountain, until they eventually reached the professor’s house. Kukui greeted them from the kitchen, where he was making dinner. He asked if Pearl would like to stay for dinner, which she politely declined.

Pearl remembered to ask Kukui about what to do next, and he told Pearl that if she was ready, she’d be able to challenge Hala in Iki town tomorrow evening. Pearl enthusiastically agreed, and the date was set.

When Pearl got home that day, she was exhausted - but in a good way. It was quite the eventful day, and there was more coming tomorrow, so she made sure to get to bed at a decent time, but not before texting her parents goodnight.

In the morning, Pearl slept in quite a bit. She didn’t really have any plans for the day, so she made sure to take the time to relax. She had only really stirred to respond to a couple of texts from her parents. 

Suddenly, Pearl heard the text tone that indicated a message from Hau. She groggily picked it up to read the message.

_> Gm Pearl ^^_

_> >gooooooooooooooooood morning i’m like half asleep right now_

_> Oh I get that I just woke up too lol_

_> I was wondering if you wanted to come over today! I was maybe gonna invite Lillie too we could hang and watch some WSLFS !!_

_> >oooh sounds good! lemme get ready to go first!! i’ll be there in like an hour probs_

_> Alright!! I’ll be waiting :D_

Pearl got dressed and said goodbye to Melba for the day, and she was off. Once outside, Pearl released Poppy and Azul from their pokeballs to join her on the short walk to Hau’s house. This was the first time Poppy and Azul had met, and Azul seemed quite curious about this new friend.

They seemed to chatter with each other for a bit, before Azul playfully jumped along with Poppy. Pearl was glad to see her pokemon had hit it off so quickly.

She scooped up Azul under her arm and grabbed Poppy by the strings and made her way towards Iki town and Hau’s house.

Once Pearl arrived, she was greeted by Hala, who seemed happy to see her pokemon as well as her. He asked Pearl if she was ready for their battle that evening, to which Pearl gave an enthusiastic reply of ‘ _yes_ ’. She asked if it’d be alright if Poppy and Azul came inside the house with her, and Hala just laughed and told her ‘ _of course_ ’.

Once inside, Hala yelled down the hall to Hau that Pearl had arrived. He poked his head out of his room and waved to Pearl. She walked down the hall and joined Hau in his room, where he had a set of VHS tapes and an old CRT TV prepped and ready.

Lillie arrived around 15 minutes later, and Hau popped the VHS for ‘ _With Sweet Love from Strawberries_ ’ into the TV’s VHS slot.

The three watched the old shoujo anime for hours, and Lillie would end up getting surprisingly into it. Pearl was glad the three had something they could share with each other, and was happy to see Lillie open up a bit.

They got through the first season until a knock fell upon Hau’s bedroom door - it was Hala.

“Hey you three, just here to let you know it’s about a 15-minute warning until Pearl and I were going to head to the town center to battle. Hau, Lillie, you’re welcome to come and watch if you want.” he said in his usual calm and reassuring voice.

“Heck yea! Can we go now, if that’s alright?” Pearl replied as she jolted up from the bed she was sitting on.

“Ho ho, I like your energy. Sure thing, I have a bunch of battles to get through tonight as a part of the festival, so it never hurts to get started early.”

With that, the Hau turned off the TV and got ready to go, as did Lillie. Hau’s house was right next to the town’s center square, so it was barely a walk to get there.

Hau and Lillie sat down on the temporary bleachers that had been set up on one side of the raised battle platform in the town’s center, and Pearl followed Hala up onto the platform, where they stood at opposite sides of each other.

A crowd of bystanders began to form around the wooden platform, all watching to see what the outcome of the battle would be.

“Let me say this, Pearl… the progress you’ve made along with Hau in these very few days is astounding. The two of you will surely grow into exceptional trainers - let me serve as your first major challenge on your journey!” Hala said, and as he finished speaking, he pounded his feet on the platform. Then, he raised his voice, as he was speaking out to the crowd;

“I am Hala, the Kahuna of Melemele island! I’m renowned as a fighting-type specialist, and nothing fires me up like a good battle with the fiery youth of this island! So, to everyone here, please give Pearl your most warm welcome as she steps on this stage!”

Pearl was unfamiliar with this amount of attention, but just as the night she had battled Hau had gone, she was exhilarated by the energy of the situation. With her pokemon still out by her side, Pearl untangled Poppy’s strings from her hand and sent it forwards onto the battlefield.

Hala smirked.

“A flying-ghost type is a clever choice! Let’s see where the winds of battle take us!” he shouted, as to lift his voice above the noises of the crowd.

“My friend mankey, let this be the start of a glorious battle!”

After he spoke, Hala sent out a mankey, who was jumping around to its own beat.

Pearl called out to Poppy, instructing it to use gust on her opponent. In response, Hala told his mankey to use focus energy. But it was to no avail, as Poppy’s next gust attack was a critical hit and knocked out his mankey.

“Yes!!” Pearl yelled out as Hala recalled the fainted pokemon into its pokeball.

“That was a good one, kid! I’m afraid my next pokemon is a bit under-equipped to handle a ghost type…”

As the words left his mouth, Hala sent out a small makuhita. It tried to use fake out on Poppy, but the attack didn’t do anything.

_This must be like the rattata!_ ; Pearl thought, as she instructed her pokemon to use gust once more. It took a bit to wear through its HP, but the makuhita eventually went down after getting a few sand attacks in.

Without a word, Hala sent out his last pokemon with a glint in his eye - crabrawler. 

Pearl went and stuck to her strategy of using gust over and over, but after her first attack, the crabrawler hit her with the unexpected - a dark-type attack, pursuit. Given crabrawler’s physical strength and the move’s type advantage, Poppy was knocked out easily.

Pearl stood back in shock, as she wasn’t expecting the attack, but didn’t let it get to her - after all, this was Hala’s last pokemon, and Pearl was down to her final pokemon as well. It was truly a one on one now, and Pearl was as determined as ever.

She recalled Poppy into its pokeball and sent Azul forwards, who had previously been watching from behind Pearl.

“Hit ‘em hard and hit em fast, let’s go with aqua jet!” she cried out, raising her voice enough for Azul to hear over the crowd.

Hala and his crabrawler switched their stance, and he called for crabrawler to use power-up punch. It didn’t do much, but Pearl knew it would be devastating if she allowed it to build up power and didn’t knock it out soon.

It had gotten to the nitty-gritty of the battle - both parties were on their last legs. But Azul was faster than crabrawler, and with one final aqua jet, the opposing pokemon fell to the ground and was recalled into its pokeball.

Pearl cheered and lifted Azul up in her arm and swirled him around in victory. Hala grinned and walked towards Pearl, outstretching his hand to shake hers.

“Congratulations Pearl! You’ve cleared your very first island! How do you feel?” he said, a smile still on his face.

“I feel… amazing! That was a super good battle!” Pearl replied, heartily shaking Hala’s hand.

Cheers echoed from around the platform, and Pearl was able to spot Hau and Lillie all the way back in the bleachers - the two were standing cheering for her. Pearl couldn’t help but get a little teary-eyed from the emotion of the situation.

Hala requested Pearl get out her trainer’s passport to stamp it, which Pearl enthusiastically did so. It was a large stamp that took up the entire passport page, and Pearl couldn’t stop staring at it in pride. But she couldn’t shake the feeling that the totem figure the stamp depicted looked… familiar.

Pearl shook the feeling for the moment and exited off the platform, where she was greeted by Hau and Lillie. Hau gave Pearl a big hug, while Lillie stood by with a smile on her face. The professor also approached Pearl, and he seemed pleased as well.

“Grats, Pearl! That was really close, but you made it! I guess that makes two of us that’ve beaten grandpa, now!” Hau said in delight.

“Yeah cuz, that was a pretty enthralling battle!” Kukui chimed in.

“Ha, thanks! So, Kukui, what’s next?” Pearl asked the professor.

“Settle down there! The next island for your journey would be Akala island, but why don’t you take a bit of a break? I’m sure your pokemon would appreciate it!”

“Awh, alright. But I guess they kind of deserve it, right Azul?” Pearl said as she looked down to her pokemon, but her expression shifted to that of worry once she saw that her pokemon was seemingly in pain.

“Azul…?”

Pearl reached out to her pokemon, but before she could, she jolted back as Azul began to glow.

Her expression of worry quickly turned to fascination when she realized what Azul was doing - _Azul was evolving_! 

After being consumed in light for a few seconds, the light slowly faded, and there Azul was - no longer a popplio, but a brionne.

Pearl dove to the ground and gave Azul a big hug in his new changed form. The battle must’ve been enough for Azul to evolve; she thought.

But Azul was still tired from the battle, so Pearl recalled him back into his pokeball to let him rest.

She spent the rest of the day chatting with Hau and Lillie some before heading back home and collapsing into bed.

_Today was a good day._


	5. bro it's LANA TIME

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> this is where i started giving up on titling the chapters lol

It was the buzzing of her phone that woke Pearl up. She had thought she had set it to silent the night before, but figured she must’ve forgotten. She lifted her phone slightly to check, and saw it was her parents wishing her a good morning.

Pearl sat up in her bed to properly text her parents good night on their end, but as she shifted her legs, Pearl knocked her bag that had been sitting on her bed to the floor with a loud clunk.

The noise made Pearl jump, and she quickly skittered across the bed and onto the floor to investigate, as she wasn’t quite sure what in the bag made such a loud sound. Sifting through her bag, Pearl found the source of the sound at the very bottom - the shiny rock Pearl had found after her encounter with Nebby on the bridge.

_That’s right_ ; Pearl thought. She had meant to ask Zinnia about it - as asking Zinnia was often more reliable than texting her uncle Steven directly.

She collected the fallen contents of her bag and hung it up by the shoulder strap on one of her bedposts. Then, grabbing the rock, Pearl snapped a photo, and after saying goodnight to her parents, Pearl went to text Zinnia.

>>zinnia? are you awake?

>Pearl OF COURSE I’m awake, you think I ever sleep?  
>What’s up?

>>i need help identifying a rock  
>>i found it after some weird thing saved me from a collapsing bridge

>>IMG_8778.JPG

>Oh that’s a weird looking rock lemme text Stevebro about it

[...]

>Yea so Steven has no idea what the FUCK this thing is  
>You know it’s a weird rock when the rock expert has no earthly idea what it is

>>oh, that’s really weird. thanks anyways though!

>No prob, always gives me an excuse to bug Steven ✌

>Have a good day out there btw!

Pearl set down her phone with a sigh. She couldn’t shake the feeling that the stone was important in some manner, but if even Steven couldn’t identify it, who could? 

She sent a quick text about it to Hau before lying back down and scrolling through social media.

Eventually, Pearl’s phone pinged - Hau had responded.

>That’s rlly odd? Maybe you could ask grandpa about it?  
>>idk maybe. but my uncle knows like, everything about rocks and couldn’t identify it so

>Well, Hala knows everything about this island, if this thing came from here he probably knows what it’s about

>Unless it was aliens 😱  
>>i guess i’ll give it a shot. i’ll come over after i eat lunch! i’m still pretty tired from yesterday

>That makes sense :o I was gonna be out training so we probably can’t hang out today  
>>that’s alright! i’m pretty socially exhausted rn so idk if i’d be much for conversation o(>< )o

>I get that! I’ll ttyl then!

After that text, Pearl put her phone on her bedside table and cozied up between the covers - she didn’t exactly plan on getting up until noon.

Melba woke Pearl up for lunch, and while she was still a bit sleepy after eating, Pearl headed off on her lonesome to Hau’s house to talk to Hala.

Once she arrived, Pearl knocked on the door, and it took a few moments for Hala to answer - but when he did, he seemed happy to see her.

“Well, this is a surprise! Hello Pearl! I’m sorry to tell you that Hau isn’t home right now.”

Pearl shook her head slightly.

“I know, I wanted to see you - I gotta ask you about something.”

“Well, come right in, be my guest! I’m afraid I only made lunch for myself, though”

“That’s fine! I already ate.”

As she was done speaking, Pearl swiftly moved inside the home and set her bag down on the nearby dinner table. She shuffled through the potions and pokeballs in her bag to find the rock, which she gently picked up and set down on the table.

Hala told Pearl he’d look in a second, as he was finishing up washing dishes. He nodded along as Pearl explained her story to him, making sure to honor Lillie’s request for secrecy and omitting any word about Nebby.

One Hala was finished, he dried off his hands and turned towards Pearl and the dinner table.

“Let’s see what this is about, then…”

Hala’s eyes went wide once he saw the stone.

“My goodness!”

He quickly grabbed up the stone and examined it further.

“And you say it left in a blur of electricity?”

“Mhm.” Pearl replied, looking curious as to Hala’s sudden intrigue.

Hala set down the stone and gave one of his short, hearty laughs.

“It looks like you met my good friend Tapu Koko! What a coincidence!”

“Tapu who? Wait… is this a person for a pokemon we’re talking about?”

Hala pulled out two chairs and sat down, and motioned for Pearl to do the same.

“Tapu Koko is the guardian pokemon of Melemele Island. They happen to be a good friend of mine, as well! They leave those kinds of stones with people they’ve encountered - it’s considered a good luck charm, so you should keep it with you!” Hala explained.

“Ohh, I see! I guess I kind of have Tapu Koko to thank for saving me, then.” Pearl replied.

“I’ll make sure to pass along your thanks for you! Was there anything else you needed from me?”

“Nope, I think I’ll be off now - thanks again!”

Pearl left the house with a wave and went on her way back home, where she relaxed for the rest of the day.

The following week was relatively calm for Pearl, as she was still waiting on the professor to contact her about the next island. She spent her days training her pokemon, as well as hanging out with Hau and Lillie. She also made sure to keep in contact with her parents, who were always interested to know how she was doing.

After the week was over, Pearl received a call from Kukui informing her that he’d gotten his boat repaired and was planning on heading over to Akala to see his wife, and he was wondering if Pearl would like to come along. He told her Hau and Lillie were already going to be coming, and Pearl responded with a resounding yes. 

Pearl woke up early the morning she was to leave, and made sure to pack everything she might need for a projected multi-night stay on a different island, and then some. 

She made her way to the professor’s house early, and ended up catching him and Lillie eating breakfast.

Kukui was surprised to see Pearl arrive so early, but he welcomed her inside anyway. There, the three chatted until Hau arrived. By the time he knocked on the door, Kukui and the others were pretty much already ready to go, so the four of them headed off to Kukui’s car to drive down to the Hau’oli marina.

Pearl was especially talkative during the drive, as she read over a list of attractions on a tourism website for Akala island.

“So this place really is tourist central, huh?” Pearl said to herself while scrolling.

Hau leaned over to look at Pearl’s phone.

“Yea, pretty much. The place definitely caters to people going on vacation - it’s tourist season right now, I hope we won’t run into any trouble with the trials because of it.” he said.

Kukui chimed in as he drove.

“Well, if you do have any trouble, just talk to me and we can sort things out!” he said. “Oh - start packing up, the parking lot is right over there.”

The three in the backseat put their stuff back in their bags and waited as Kukui found a parking spot. Once parked, they grabbed their bags and carried them as they followed Kukui down to the docks - Pearl having the biggest suitcase of the trio.

After navigating the packed dock area, Kukui stopped and pointed to a smaller sized sailboat.

“There she is! Just had to get some routine maintenance in, but we’re ready to go!”

As the group hopped onto the small boat, Pearl fiddled around in her bag for a second, pulling out Azul’s pokeball - she figured he’d enjoy swimming along with the boat. After coming out of his pokeball, Azul stretched and yawned, and looked happy to see Pearl.

Kukui’s boat really was small - there was just enough room for the four of them and all their bags, but not much more. 

In no time at all, the four were off. The wind was favorable that day, so the boat was making good pace. As Azul splashed alongside the sailboat, Pearl and Hau looked into Akala island some more, while Lillie was sitting quietly, for the most part.

Setting her phone down, Pearl looked to Lillie and tried her best to speak over the sound of the wind and waves.

“Hey, Lillie, what were you planning on doing once we get to Akala?”

Lillie perked up a bit upon hearing the question.

“Oh, uhm, I’m not sure… I didn’t have much of an idea in the first place. I guess I’ll probably stay with the professor and Burnett…”

“Burnett? Who’s Burnett?” Pearl asked.

Kukui turned around in his seat with a smile on his face.

“That’s my WIFE!” he said proudly. “She studies alternate dimensions in her lab! It’s cool stuff, I’m sure she’d be delighted to meet you two!”

“Oh, that sounds cool! I guess I’ll have to think up an introduction, then!” Hau responded, putting his arms up behind the back of his head in a relaxed position.

There was more chatting among the four, mostly about what they wanted to do on Akala. Lillie concluded that as much as she wanted to follow Pearl and Hau, it’d be best that she stay behind with Kukui and Burnett.

Pearl made sure to promise Lillie that she’d visit in between trials, because she didn’t want her to feel lonely.

In what felt like no time at all, the four arrived at Akala’s port, which was swarming with people of all kinds. Kukui docked the boat safely, and the gang exited the boat. Pearl made sure to give her legs a good stretch, and as she was stretching, Azul flopped up onto the dock. He seemed a bit tired from the long swim, but also looked accomplished. Pearl recalled him to his pokeball and grabbed her things.

“Burnett’s lab isn’t that far of a walk from here - I’ll lead and you can follow!” Kukui said, waving his arm forwards. 

So, they were off. The walk was short, but it seemed longer from navigating the crowded sidewalks and from the blazing summer heat. Eventually, Kukui approached a building just off the main strip, and Pearl and her friends followed him inside.

The blasting air conditioning was a huge relief to Pearl, as she felt like she was about to melt.

The lobby was quiet aside from whirring of the air conditioning, and the only people there aside from the four were the desk attendant and a woman sitting on a couch staring at her phone. The woman looked up from her phone to see Kukui, and put her phone down and stood up with a smile on her face.

She approached Kukui and gave him a hug and a kiss.

“I was waiting for you! Was the trip here alright?”

Kukui scratched the side of his head and smiled.

“It was alright! These three sure are the talkative bunch, haha.”

The woman looked past Kukui to the three teenagers standing behind him.

“Oh, Lillie! It’s so nice to see you again! Kukui hasn’t been driving you crazy, has he?” she said, patting Lillie on the shoulder.

“Oh, no, not at all. It’s nice to see you again too, Burnett!” Lillie said with a smile.

Burnett turned to Pearl and Hau and put her hands on her hips.

“So, who are you two? It’s always nice to see fresh faces around here!”

Before Pearl could speak, Kukui spoke up over her.

“This is Hau, and this is Pearl! They’re two new trainers going through the island trials together, and Pearl comes all the way from Hoenn!”

“Well, isn’t that neat! Nice to meet you two - I’m Professor Burnett! I also happen to be Kukui’s wife, but I bet he told you that already.” Burnett said as she extended her arm to shake hands with Hau and Pearl. 

“It’s nice to meet you too!” Pearl said, shaking Burnett’s hand. 

With introductions out of the way, Burnett offered to take the three on a tour of her lab, and all three of them agreed. Pearl was interested in Burnett’s work in alternate dimensions, given that she was the emissary of the god of space, and knew of the existence of alternate dimensions already.

As Burnett toured the crew around that lab, she explained the kind of work that she and her team did. To the surprise of Pearl and Hau, Burnett’s team already knew about the existence of alternate dimensions in their universe, though they didn’t know much about them other than the fact that they exist.

What really caught Pearl and Hau’s attention was what Burnett excitedly mentioned next - the lab had actually received a transmission from what they believed to be a distant universe. 

Burnett explained - back in 2010, strange otherworldly holes opened up in the skies of Alola, and specific energy readings spiked. Those events slowly fizzled out, but now, those same readings that spiked were beginning to rise again. But what was really exciting, as Burnett stated, was a transmission received. It was a short audio transmission of someone speaking in an accent not from anywhere in the world, and it was the most exciting proof of a distant universe Burnett had ever seen.

Lillie looked pretty neutral hearing all of this, as opposed to Pearl and Hau’s jaws being pretty much on the floor. When Pearl asked, Lillie said that she’d been living with Kukui and Burnett, so she’d already heard about it. 

The tour soon concluded, and Pearl and Hau sat down on a couch in the lobby to chill for a little bit and figure out where they needed to go next. 

With Kukui’s input, they were able to find out that the first Akala trial captain, Lana, was busy for the next few days, so they couldn’t go forwards with trials until she was free. Hau and Pearl did manage to book times in advance, so they at least had a couple of days to train before taking on Lana’s trial.

As Pearl and Hau got up, Lillie stepped forwards and muttered a bit to catch their attention as they approached the door.

“Huh? Lillie, did you say something?” Pearl turned and asked.

“Oh, uhm… I just wanted to wish you two good luck out there! I mentioned I was going to stay behind here, but you guys have my phone number if you need anything-!” Lillie replied.

“Oh yeah, of course! I was planning on coming back around to visit you every so often, anyways. I promise we’ll keep in touch!”

With a wave and a goodbye from Lillie, Pearl and Hau were off. Their plan for the day was just some simple training, as they’d make their way to Paniola town and Brooklet hill later.

They decided to train on the route just outside of Heahea city, as it seemed to be quite popular among local trainers and tourists alike.

Pearl and Hau battled their way through plenty of wild pokemon and trainers, and were enjoying win after win. Despite the heat, Pearl and Hau felt like they could keep going for hours, fueled by the energy of the battle. 

It was after a period of this that Pearl’s attention was caught by the strangest pokemon she’d ever seen. It seemed like it was a mixed-up mess of all kinds of parts, from it’s talons in front to it’s finned tail. What was stranger though, was the teenage boy sitting down next to the pokemon. Even at some distance away, Pearl still found that he had a striking resemblance to Lillie - almost twin-like, even.

Hau noticed too, and eventually, the trainer and his pokemon caught the two staring. He got up and approached them both with an upset look.

“What the hell do you think you’re looking at?!” he said harshly.

Pearl stepped back a bit and raised her hands in front of her chest in caution, while Hau stood his ground. 

“Woah, hey, sorry! We were just looking at your pokemon, it’s uh, really neat lookin’!” Pearl said. She didn’t get a response, only a muffled ‘ _hmph_ ’.

“Well, since you approached us… wanna battle? I’m Pearl, by the way!”

“You really wanna battle that thing?” Hau whispered to Pearl, obviously wanting to leave the confrontation. Pearl just shrugged and looked onwards to the young man in front of them.

“...Fine.” he eventually replied. He struck a pose with his hand in front of his face before speaking again.

“I’m Gladion of Team Skull! And I’ll make you regret messing with me!”

“Team skull…! Pearl, are you sure you wanna do this?” Hau muttered, stepping back to provide space for the two trainers.

“Psh, why not? We wiped the floor with the last skull grunts we ran into, and all the training from today has me feelin’ confident!” Pearl replied

“Alright… I’m just getting bad vibes about that weird pokemon…”

Pearl just nodded, and called out Azul, while Gladion sent out a zubat.

Pearl had dealt with zubat before, and Azul was stronger than this particular zubat by a longshot, and it went down quickly. 

Gladion dug his feet into the ground, clearly upset - while Pearl praised Azul for doing a good job.

Gladion called out his next pokemon.

“Give ‘em hell, Type Null!”

_Type Null? What a strange name for a pokemon_ ; Pearl thought. Still, she stood her ground. While she had no idea what type the weird pokemon was, she knew that Azul could hit it hard.

Type Null let out a cry Pearl had never heard before, before stepping forwards onto the field. Pearl was unsure what to do, but decided to go for the strategy she’d been using on the trainers she’d fought on the route previously.

“Azul, bubble beam!” Pearl shouted out.

Azul shot the bubbles at Type Null, who staggered back in recoil. Gladion responded with a command to use tackle, which hit Azul rather hard for being a basic normal-type attack. After a couple exchanges of moves, both parties were down to their last leg - but Pearl pulled out her secret weapon: aqua jet.

With that, it was over, and Type Null stumbled as Gladion recalled it to its pokeball with a sneer. 

“Nice one, Pearl!” Hau said, holding up his hand to give her a high-five. Pearl high-fived her friend and then turned to Gladion.

“Hey, thanks! That was a good battle!” she said to him - but Gladion just grumbled. 

“Can I ask you something, actually” Pearl followed up with.

“You better make it quick…” Gladion mumbled.

“Do you know anyone named Lillie, by any chance?”

Gladion stood ajar. His face’s expression turned to that of shock, but it soon drifted back into his usual disgruntled one. He didn’t respond, and just gathered his things and stormed away.

“Well, that guy’s sure a sunny figure…” Hau said, scratching his head.

“For sure, what was his deal?” Pearl replied.

“Should’ve gotten a pic of Type Null to show the professor - maybe he would’ve had an idea of what it was.”

The two friends just shrugged it off, and decided to call it a day and head back to the Pokecenter to heal up and chill for the evening. Pearl meant to make a mental note to ask Lillie if she knew Gladion, but ended up forgetting by the time she got some downtime.

After the long day, Hau and Pearl stayed in one of the rooms in the Pokemon Center overnight.

\--

The next morning, Pearl woke up early, with a plan. She made sure to text her parents good morning, and slid down the Pokecenter’s bunk bed’s ladder to wake up Hau. Hau was rather groggy, and shoved his face into the pillow, asking Pearl to give him a couple more minutes before he was ready to wake up.

Pearl sighed, but ultimately honored her friend’s request, and sat idly by while scrolling on her phone.

It did take some time, but Hau eventually sat up with a stretch and a loud yawn. The two friends got ready to leave, and decided they’d make their way up to Paniola town so they’d be close by Brooklet Hill by the time it was their turn to take their trials.

They could’ve opted to take the bus that ran the route connecting Heahea and Paniola, but Hau and Pearl decided it’d be nice to train along the route to get the extra experience in.

Upon finally arriving in town, the two looked around in awe at how different the town looked compared to Heahea.

“Man, it’s like an old Unovan movie come to life!” Hau said. He ran ahead of Pearl a bit and stood in a stance in front of her. He pointed his hands at Pearl, both of which were in a finger-gun position. “C’mon, put ‘em up! We could have an old school draw fight here!”

Pearl laughed.

“Haha, you’re kind of right!” she said, followed by her ruffling in her bag a bit. Pearl pulled out one of her pokeballs and held it up. “You know, we can’t have a draw fight, but we can always have a pokemon battle!”

Hau made a smirk and grabbed one of his pokeballs as well.

“Oh, you’re on!”

It was a quick, casual battle, and though it was close, Pearl came out as the winner. Hau sighed in defeat as he recalled his fainted pokemon, but didn’t have any hard feelings about it. 

The two friends made their way to the Pokemon Center, where they healed up their tired pokemon and discussed their plans for the rest of the day.

Hau was planning on exploring the town, as he had heard it there was a famous local restaurant, and he wanted to try the food there. Pearl wanted to train a bit more, so the two friends said goodbye to each other for the moment as they parted ways.

On her way out of the Pokecenter, Pearl noticed a promotional ad for heal balls, which caused her to think. She only had two pokemon with her, and the upcoming trial was centered around water-type pokemon - which her frontrunner Azul had an unfavorable matchup against. Pearl shrugged to herself and went to the Pokemart section of the center to buy a couple, because while Pearl still had a few regular pokeballs left over, these ones were _pink_.

With that, Pearl was off on her way to the route connecting Paniola town and Brooklet hill. Some quick searching on the internet revealed that there was a very diverse variety of pokemon living on the route, so it’d likely be her best shot at getting a new team member.

As Pearl navigated the route and battled and chased various wild pokemon along with Poppy, none of them really stood out to her - they just didn’t click. It got frustrating after a while, to a point where Pearl wasn’t really watching where she was stepping through the tall grass. Then it hit her - or rather, Pearl hit it.

Pearl fell to the dirt with an ungraceful thump. She groaned, and picked herself up and dusted herself off. She turned to look to see what she had tripped on, and there sat a rather upset fomantis.

“Sorry!” Pearl said, the pokemon cocking its head at her words. It still seemed upset, and tried to headbutt Pearl’s leg. Pearl thought for a moment, before stepping back and calling Poppy forwards. “Do you want to battle?”

The fomantis jumped back in response, and attempted to hit Poppy with a fury cutter - but it was so slow that Poppy just drifted out of the way. A couple of attacks in, and Pearl started feeling a bit bad for the poor fomantis, who was obviously looking a bit tired. Then Pearl remembered - heal balls heal the caught pokemon to full condition once used. And then her brain made the connection of fomantis being a grass type, and the next trial being water-centric - and suddenly, it all made sense.

Pearl ordered Poppy to back off and rustled around in her bag for a heal ball. Then, with a confident stance, Pearl threw the ball at the fomantis, and it bounced off the bulb on its forehead before encapsulating it.

1… 2… 3… click! Fomantis was caught!

Pearl picked the ball up from the ground and dusted it off. She decided she’d let her new teammate rest a little bit before getting to know them.

She thought of names in her head, and her mind went to the pink color of the pokemon’s skin, and how it reminded her so much of the seas of cherry blossoms in the shoujo anime she watched. 

_Cherry sounds like a cute name_ ; Pearl thought - and just like that, it was settled. Pearl’s new companion’s name was Cherry.

Pearl headed back to the Pokemon Center to heal her pokemon, and once she returned to the room she was staying in, she released Cherry from her pokeball to get to know her. Cherry seemed grateful that Pearl had healed her, but was still a bit shy. Pearl then released Poppy and Azul, and the three pokemon made their various noises together, and seemed to get along well. After meeting her other pokemon, Cherry seemed a lot more relaxed around Pearl, and she was glad about that.

Pearl took it easy for the rest of the day, and most of her thoughts were about the trial she’d be going through the next day. She hoped that with Cherry now on her team, she’d be able to emerge victorious from whatever the trial captain threw her way.

\--

Pearl’s morning routine was the same the next day - get up, text her parents, brush her teeth, bug Hau. Though this morning, she cut Hau some slack, since his trial time was in the afternoon. Pearl had chosen the earliest possible time slot, and was excited to get moving, even if it was early. 

Pearl left the Pokemon Center and released all 3 of her pokemon to let them walk with her over to Brooklet hill. As Pearl started her trek, she noticed that Cherry was having difficulty keeping up with her stubby little legs. She turned to offer to carry her, but it seemed that Poppy was quicker to offer its help - lifting Cherry off the ground with it’s strings. Cherry seemed thankful, and happily squeaked as Poppy drifted along.

The team managed to squeeze in some training along the way to the trial location, and in no time at all, they reached the trial gates at Brooklet hill. Waiting there for them was a blue-haired girl who looked no older than 13, which was a surprise to Pearl. The girl was fiddling with a fancy-looking fishing rod until she noticed Pearl approach.

“Hi! My name’s Pearl, I’m here for the first Akala island trial. Are you the trial captain Lana by any chance?” Pearl asked.

The girl cocked her head.

“And what if I’m not? What would you do then?”

“Huh… what?” Pearl was a bit confused, which showed itself on her face.

The girl paused for a moment, looking at Pearl. Then, she laughed.

“I’m just messing with you.” she said as she hopped off the rock she was sitting on. She approached Pearl and extended her hand for a handshake, but pulled it back as Pearl tried to shake her hand. “Yeah, I’m Lana. You ready?”

Pearl was still left confused and a bit shocked by Lana’s attitude, but her excitement for the trial overshadowed it.

“Of course I am!”

“Good. Let’s go then.” Lana said as she turned and walked down the path to the trial site.

Pearl didn’t know what she expected Lana to be like, but she was certainly a lot more blunt than Pearl had imagined. Still, she followed her down to the hill, where she was waiting in front of a large body of water.

“Hope you don’t mind getting wet. Here’s the low-down;” Lana said, waiting for Pearl to confirm she was ready for an explanation. Pearl nodded, and Lana turned towards the water. “The waters here are usually pretty calm, so I hope you’ll be able to notice the heavy disturbances on the surface. There’s some angry pokemon there, and I want you to chase them downstream. Good luck!”

With that, Lana hopped down the ledges on the Brooklet Hill trail without a second word. Pearl stood and stared for a moment before shrugging to herself. Perhaps Lana hadn’t woken up yet? It was whatever to Pearl, who was just eager to start.

She called forward Azul and instructed him to swim towards the splashing in the water to scare the pokemon off, and he did just that. It seemed simple to Pearl, too simple, in fact. Azul swam back to Pearl, and her and the team walked downstream to the next big pool. Lana was nowhere to be seen, so Pearl just assumed she was gone all the way to the sea at the end of the trail.

Again, Azul scared off the angry pokemon, and returned to Pearl. She was confused, if anything - not even having to battle the pokemon was odd. She was suspecting Lana’s deadpan attitude might be an act, and that something must be coming. Pearl wasn’t sure if it was her imagination or not, but it almost seemed like it had gotten a lot cloudier since she had first arrived.

For the third time, Pearl sent out Azul to scare the splashing pokemon downstream. The smell of the ocean was stronger than ever, so Pearl assumed she was close to the end of the trail. As she began walking down the trail once more, Pearl noticed that it started to rain. Because of this, she took Cherry from Poppy and held her in her arms, and recalled Poppy back to it’s pokeball so it wouldn’t get wet.

As Pearl got closer to the ocean, the small drizzle escalated into an almost torrential downpour. Pearl was certain something was up, and when she reached Lana, she saw she had a sinister grin on her face.

“Alright! The totem pokemon is just over there! Good luck!” Lana said, waving to Pearl through the rain and pointing towards an area of violent splashing.

Pearl felt her confidence drop a bit. Whatever was in there was big. But she swallowed her fear and moved forwards. Pearl left her bag by the shore, and one by one, Pearl hopped on the trail of rocks leading out to the area of splashing, clutching Cherry to her chest.

Approaching the tumultuous water, Pearl was hesitant. Still, she crouched down, holding Cherry with one arm, and reached out to the splashes. Suddenly, they stopped, and for a moment everything seemed calm.

Then, all of a sudden, a massive pokemon cried out and breached the water. Pearl stumbled back on the rocks as it fell back into the water and soaked Pearl and Cherry. Looking in front of her, a massive school of wishiwashi was swimming with most of its body out of the water. Pearl got up, and stood her ground. She sent Cherry forwards, and shouted her first command.

“Cherry, go at it with a leaf blade!”

But Cherry was too slow, and the wishiwashi school hit her with water gun first. Luckily, it wasn’t very effective, and Cherry shrugged off the hit. 

Cherry slashed at the wishiwashi, and it appeared it was a hard hit, as the school cried out. As a result of the school’s cries, from the depths beneath the rocks, an alomomola emerged and began circling around the wishiwashi.

A 2-on-1 is gonna be tough; Pearl thought, quickly giving Cherry the command to use another leaf blade attack. But just as Cherry’s attack landed, the circling alomomola used what appeared to be heal pulse, negating all the damage Cherry had done.

Pearl knew she had to do something about the alomomola if she wanted any chance at winning against the school, but Cherry’s HP was getting low and Pearl didn’t want to use her turn healing. 

Holding her ground, Pearl commanded Cherry to attack the alomomola instead of the wishiwashi school. Despite the super-effective hit, the alomomola took it well and continued to swim around the wishiwashi.

Attack after attack, the alomomola’s HP was getting low - but before Cherry could land the finishing blow, the alomomola attacked with double slap and knocked Cherry out. 

Pearl clutched her fainted pokemon and sent her back into her pokeball. Pearl was worried - she didn’t have an advantage against the totem pokemon anymore, but the alomomola was almost out, so it was only a matter of time, she thought.

Pearl sent out Poppy, who drifted a little in the wind and rain. With one final shadow ball, the alomomola was knocked out and returned to the depths. Now, all that was left was the giant school of wishiwashi. 

Pearl decided to stick to her usual strategy when using Poppy against non-normal types - which was to keep using minimize to avoid most hits and then hit the opponent with shadow ball. 

While the wishiwashi school hit Poppy pretty hard the first time, after a couple minimizes it couldn’t land a hit on it. Then, it was all up to whittling down it’s health. Slowly but surely, the school’s HP went down, and eventually, after one final shadow ball, the school let out a terrifying cry and dispersed.

Soon, the rain cleared, and the sun shone down. It took a second for Pearl to realize it, but she had won. She flapped her hands excitedly and jumped to hug Poppy, but as she did so, Pearl slipped on the wet rock she was standing on and fell into the water.

She swam to the surface and laughed, and grabbed Poppy’s strings as she swam to the shore.

Waiting for her on the shore was Lana, who was clapping her hands with an impressed smile on her face. Once Pearl made it to shore, Lana spoke.

“Woah, good job! Yaknow, it’s pretty impressive you didn’t run away screaming once my school of wishiwashi breached. What were you expecting to come out of the water?”

“I dunno, Kyogre?” Pearl said, shrugging.

“Kehehe, you know, I caught a Kyogre once!” Lana replied with a snicker.

Pearl tilted her head.  
“No you didn’t. I know her, and my mom doesn’t like her.”

“What?” Lana said with a confused look.

Pearl realized she probably should have said that, but the confusion on Lana’s face over her statement had Pearl stifling laughter. 

After a moment of silence, Lana spoke up.

“Anyways… if you’d get out your trainer’s passport, I can stamp it for you showing that you’ve completed the trial.”

Pearl nodded and went over to grab her bag. She sifted around in it for a couple seconds to locate her passport, and once she got it out, she handed it to Lana, who promptly stamped it.

Pearl thanked Lana, and waved goodbye as she started her trek back up the trail.

Pearl returned to her room in the Pokemon Center to find that Hau wasn’t there. Pearl checked her phone, and found that she had missed a text from him saying he’d be out for a bit before the trial. Pearl sighed, and went to change out of her sopping wet clothes. Once in her pajamas, Pearl got cozy in bed and napped for the rest of the day.

_I gotta tell Lillie all about this._


	6. hiker david for best pokeau 2020

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the shortest chapter so far, mostly filler :p

Pearl was still giddy over her win, even after the day had passed. She was sure to text her parents about it, and of course, _Lillie_. Pearl already told Hau all about her experience once he returned to the hotel, so she felt it was only appropriate to inform her other adventuring buddy as well.

Though, as Pearl would quickly realize, texting Lillie yielded no results. It seemed Lillie hadn’t even seen the texts, as no read receipt showed up. Hau got similar results, so the two concluded something must’ve been interfering. Pearl ended up calling the professor instead, to ask about Lillie and talk about her win.

Kukui told Pearl that Lillie had broken her phone - or more appropriately, Nebby had broken it. He also seemed content to listen to Pearl’s enthusiastic rambling about her adventures, and promised he’d tell Lillie about it.

After her call with Kukui, Pearl decided it’d be best to head back over to Heahea city and get details from the professor on what the next steps on the island trials would be.

While hiking back to the city with Hau, the two discussed the possibilities for the next trial. According to a preliminary internet search, there were two other trials on the island - the fire trial located at Wela Volcano park, and the grass trial located in the Lush jungle. Hau noted he’d prefer to take on the grass trial first, while Pearl said she’d prefer to take on the fire-type trial instead. 

Pearl didn’t necessarily want to split up from her friend, but she knew she’d always have contact with Hau, so she let it go. The two bantered all the way back to the Dimensional Research Lab, and when they arrived, they were surprised to see Lillie was outside in the parking lot with Nebby.

“Alright Nebby! Use… uh… splash?” Lillie said, not realizing Hau and Pearl had arrived.

Nebby didn’t seem to follow her commands, and instead began teleporting around her playfully.

“C’mon Nebs-! At least humor me here!” she spoke in a frustrated tone, before turning around and jumping a bit when she saw Hau and Pearl watching.

“Gah-!! How long were you two watching…?”

Hau snickered a bit, and Pearl responded:

“We just got here! What were you doing, anyways?” she asked, cocking her head to the side a bit.

“Oh… well… it’s kind of embarrassing…”

“Come on, from what I saw it didn’t look too out of the ordinary.”

Lillie mumbled and wrung her hands a little bit.

“Well… da… the professor told me about everything you did! It was really exciting to hear about and I guess…” Lillie’s words started to trail off as she started mumbling even more. 

“...I guess I just wanted to try being a cool trainer like you, Pearl.”

Pearl stared blankly at Lillie for a few seconds before smiling sweetly.

“Oh, haha, I’m not that cool of a trainer!” she chuckled, waving her hand in front of her face. 

“But it’s uh, really flattering that you think that…”

There was an awkward moment of silence between the three as Pearl’s words trailed off. After that, Hau broke it.

“Well, we were here to see the professor to get info on what to do next.” he said in a matter-of-fact tone, propping his hands up behind his head.

“Right! That’s what we were doing. Is the professor here, Lillie?” Pearl asked.

“He’s inside working! But I’m sure he won’t mind a visit from you guys, he talks about you two a lot, after all…”

Lillie retrieved Nebby to her bag and motioned for the two friends to follow her inside the lab. They took the elevator up to the laboratory level, and found Kukui talking with his wife while eating lunch.

Kukui waved at the three and finished chewing before he spoke.

“Oi, champs in the making! Good to see you two after the trial!”

Pearl and Hau waved back and approached the professor to talk more.

Pearl was more than eager to discuss the next steps, but Kukui gestured to her to slow down as he took another bite of his sandwich.

“Woah there! I get you’re excited, but you don’t wanna burn yourself out!” he said, setting down his sub. “Why not take it easy for a little bit? Get to know Heahea, yea?”

Pearl huffed a bit, and ultimately sighed.

“I suppose so… I could always use more training time…”

Suddenly, Kukui’s phone buzzed. He picked it up to look, and with an exclamation of ‘Oh!’, he quickly sent a reply to the text before turning to Lillie.

“Phone’s fixed! Think you can head down there yourself? I was gonna be busy with Burnett after we finished eating.” he said.

Lillie thought for a moment.

“Yeah, I’m sure I’ll be fine!” she said, but Pearl quickly raised her hand to interject.

“Could I come? Maybe we could go shopping!”

Lillie looked a bit shocked and mumbled to herself a bit, before she spoke up, smiling in Pearl’s direction.

“That’d be wonderful!” Lillie then turned to Hau. “Hau, would you want to join?”

“Nah, I’m good. I wanted to look into some of the books here, you guys can have fun on your own!” he replied.

Lillie and Pearl said their goodbyes to the professors and Hau, before heading back out into the humid summer air of Heahea city. Pearl input the address of the store that had fixed Lillie’s phone. It wasn’t a very long walk, as the Dimensional Research Lab was located fairly close to the city’s big shopping center. Still, Pearl and Lillie chattered along the way - Pearl recounting her adventures, and Lillie listening attentively. A couple of times during the walk, Lillie had to wrangle Nebby from inside the bag, as it seemed they wanted out to see Pearl.

The two finally reached the shopping center, and air conditioning and smells of fountain water blasted over them as they entered. It was fairly busy, so Pearl released Poppy from it’s pokeball to act as a sort of ‘beacon’ in case she got separated from Lillie. They found the phone repair booth, and Lillie was able to get her phone back.

“...What now?” Lillie asked, cocking her head towards Pearl.

“We go… shopping? It’s a mall, after all! You don’t have to worry about money, my parents said they’d cover anything I spent in Alola!”

“I’ve never, uh… gone shopping before…” Lillie replied, her tone quiet and almost embarrassed.

“Huh what? Seriously? Well, I guess now’s a great time to have your first shopping spree!”

Lillie still looked a bit confused, but she gladly followed as Pearl grabbed her arm and the two went off to cruise the stores that the complex had to offer.

Lillie seemed fairly reserved when it came to shopping, as opposed to Pearl, who had practically constructed herself a new wardrobe. After some insistence from Pearl, Lillie chose a new outfit, but didn’t actually put it on.

“I’ve never… done this before…” Lillie said, holding her newly selected clothes in the checkout line.

“Done what? You’ve already told me you’ve never gone shopping before.” Pearl replied.

“...Chosen clothes for myself. My mother always chose my outfits…”

Pearl curiously tilted her head. She’d never heard of Lillie’s parents before, she had just assumed Kukui and Burnet acted as her parents, especially considering Lillie almost called Kukui ‘dad’.

“Your mom? What’s she like?” Pearl asked, hoping she wasn’t prying too close.

“Well… she’s…” the rest of Lillie’s words were mumbles, and the two’s conversation was interrupted by the clerk working at the cash register. Given her reaction, Pearl decided it was best to not try and find out more.

The two friends spent the rest of the day shopping, and at the end of the day, alongside new clothes, Pearl and Lillie had stopped by a bakery and gotten some sweets; as well as buying matching Hello Skitty and Cutie Clefairy plushies as a symbol of friendship.

Upon returning to the lab, Pearl was able to convince Kukui to sign her up for the next trial, as the next opening was a couple of weeks away, anyways.

For those following weeks, Pearl spent it with a mix of training, hanging out with Hau and Lillie, and exploring the city. She had the freedom to do whatever she wanted, so Pearl definitely made sure to take advantage of that. She also still made sure to keep in touch with her family, updating them on her adventures.

\--

>Pearlllll

>Pearlllllllllllllllllllllllllll

>>what is it hau -_____- i just woke up

>Guess what today is 👀

>>wh

>>SHIT YOURE RIGHT

>>SORRY GTG ILY

\--

Pearl slammed down her phone and haphazardly flailed out of bed. Today was the day of her second trial on Akala! She had stayed up late the night previously out of anxious excitement, yet had totally forgotten when she woke up.

She got dressed and ready, and headed out of the hotel to catch a bus to Wela Volcano Park. 

Once Pearl arrived, she started her trek up the hiking trail, and let out Azul to walk with her - as she figured he’d be particularly helpful during the coming battles. While Pearl had to mostly carry Azul, she didn’t mind. 

Pearl and Azul battled their way up the trail, to eventually reach the ever-so-familiar gates that marked the entrance to the trial grounds. Standing just outside of them was a young man with fiery brown hair, practicing that appeared to be dance moves with an Alolan marowak.

Pearl called out to him, and he stopped, and turned around to wave.

“Hey! You must be the next challenger, right?” he said, shooing his marowak away in the direction of the trial gate. “Your name’s, uh… Pearl, right? I’m Kiawe!”

Kiawe extended his hand to Pearl, and she happily shook it.

“Yep, that’s me! Nice to meet you! So, should we get started?” Pearl asked.

“A fiery spirit! I like it! C’mon, if you’re ready, follow me!” Kiawe exclaimed, waving his arm in the direction his marowak had just run off to.

Pearl eagerly followed Kiawe up the hill beyond the gate, and once they reached the top, the two came upon a stage, where three marowak were waiting.

“This trial… is a test of your memory! My pokemon here will show you two versions of a dance… and it’s up to you to remember which one dances differently! Sound alright?”

“Yep! I’m ready!” Pearl said as she set Azul back down on the dusty earth. 

Pearl took a seat on a nearby rock and watched as the marowak performed...

The pokemon did coordinated spins, jumps, and tossed around their flaming bone clubs. Pearl made sure to clap after the first performance, and after the second, she was prompted by Kiawe to choose which marowak had moved differently.

“The one on the right side,” Pearl said. “It turned to the left, not the right.”

“Correct! Now, marowak, come battle with Pearl as you make your exit from the stage!” Kiawe shouted, and as he did, the ride-side marowak ran towards Pearl and Azul.

Pearl and Azul quickly got into a battle stance, and Pearl called out her first attack.

The battle was short, as Pearl had been training a lot beforehand. After it was knocked out of battle, the marowak tiredly trudged to sit on a rock by Kiawe, who gave it a pat on the head.

The next dance continued - it was the same dance, just with 2 marowak instead of 3. At the very end of the second dance, a blonde hiker jumped out from behind the stage.

“HOO-YAH!” he yelled, catching Pearl completely off-guard. Before she could say anything about the hiker, Kiawe continued as normal, though it was evident he was trying to hide a laugh.

“So! What’s different about this dance?” he said, a silly smile on his face.

It took Pearl a second to realize it was a joke.

“Ohhhh!” she exclaimed. “It’d have to be the hiker!”

“Yes!! Now go, my hiker!” Kiawe shouted once more, and that was the hiker’s cue to send out his pokemon - a magmar.

The battle went about as smoothly as the battle with the marowak, with Pearl swiftly defeating it with Azul’s water-type moves. The hiker recalled his fainted pokemon and scratched the back of his head.

“Wow, kid’s strong!” he said, before walking over to sit on a rock by Kiawe.

“Thanks David!” Kiawe said with a laugh, before turning to Pearl with a serious expression. “So, you ready for the last dance?”

“Yes!!” Pearl exclaimed, bouncing her leg in anticipation.

So, the final dance began. As with the previous dances, it was the same - until the very end of the second variation. A toxicly sweet-smelling stench wafted through the area, and a hissing noise could be heard from behind the stage.

Pinching his nose shut, Kiawe tried to speak as best he could through the smell.

“Alright…! What’s, ack, different about this dance?”

“The-” Pearl began to say, but before she could finish, a massive salazzle hopped out from behind the stage.

“Too early! But good job!” Kiawe said to the pokemon, who looked a bit embarrassed. He motioned for the salazzle to go forwards, and it reared towards Pearl. 

Once again, Pearl and Azul got into their battle stances, and the battle with the totem pokemon began.

“Azul, bubble beam!” Pearl shouted.

But the salazzle was slick, and managed to hit Azul with toxic first. Pearl knew she had to knock out the salazzle fast before the poison damage became too much. Pearl sifted around in her bag, but couldn’t find an antidote.

“Damnit!” she said under her breath, realizing she hadn’t considered the opposing pokemon would be a dual fire-poison type. She had to think fast - and her first instinct was to just keep using bubble beam, as it was Azul’s strongest move.

Pearl got the salazzle to about half health before it called out a salandit from the surrounding volcano. Pearl however, didn’t break a sweat. With just an aqua jet, Azul was able to one-shot the weaker male pokemon and focus on the salazzle more. It quickly became evident to Pearl that the salazze didn’t have any non-fire type attack move, so it wasn’t doing much damage to Azul.

It was getting down to the line - poison was whittling away at Azul, but Salazzle was about one hit away from fainting. Confidently, Pearl called out for Azul to use aqua jet, and before the salazzle could attack, Azul jetted towards it in a burst of water, knocking it out.

Pearl gained a huge smile and excitedly scampered towards Azul to give him a victory hug, but as she did, Azul finally succumbed to the poison and fainted. Pearl’s enthusiasm quickly turned to panic, but Kiawe swooped in.

“Whup, here we go! This should heal ‘em up!” he said, handing Pearl a revive and a few potions.

Though Pearl almost seemed like she was about to cry, she quickly perked up.

“Thank you-!” she said, healing Azul back up as fast as she could. Once Azul was perky again, Pearl made sure to give him a big, proper victory hug.

“No problem! You’ve got a strong pokemon on your hands, that was a fun battle to watch - right David?” Kiawe said as he turned to the hiker. David smiled and gave a silent thumbs up to Pearl as he healed the marowak sitting next to him. “Here, take out your trainer’s passport so I can stamp it to signify your win!”

Pearl nodded, and quickly located her passport from her bag. Kiawe took out an orange-red stamp, and placed a stamp right next to the blue one she had gotten from Lana’s trial. 

“Oh, looks like you have one trial left! I should call Mallow and make arrangements, then…” Kiawe said, nodding and taking out his phone.

“Mallow? Are they another trial captain?” Pearl asked.

“You’re sharp - just as sharp as you were during the trial! She is indeed - the grass-type trial captain!” Kiawe paused and stared at his phone for a second. “Can I have your phone number? The way this final trial will work is a bit different, so I’ll need your contact info directly.”

Pearl gave Kiawe her contact information, and waved goodbye to him and David as she left the trial grounds. The sun was beginning to set over the island, and Pearl looked out the window of the bus back to Heahea in awe at the shimmering sea. 

Suddenly, she got a text - from Lillie!

>Hello Pearl! Are you done with the trial?

>>yea!! went great :DDD what’s up?

>Oh wonderful! You’ll have to tell me about it when you next visit the lab.

>I wanted to ask something of you.

>>yea? what is it?

>It’s a long journey to the final trial ground. Can you please take me with you?

>>of course!!


	7. colress shows up also mallow time

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i wrote this during an internet outage which only goes to prove i CAN be productive if i don't have access to secondlife. anyways.
> 
> this is the certified Crongiest chapter yet i think and i DO NOT care because i do what i want.
> 
> -looks at colress, lune, and n- love loses <3
> 
> AO3 note:  
> im sorry for including my hell ot3 but since colress shows up in sunmoon he was bound to meet pearl which was just another chance for me to expose my colress/n/lune brainrot

The next day, when Pearl arrived at Burnet’s lab, she was quick to spot Lillie swinging her legs on a nearby bench in the lobby, waiting. Pearl called out to her, and Lillie suddenly perked up.

“Pearl!” Lillie exclaimed with a smile as she got up from where she was seated. She ran over to Pearl with a determined look.

“Kukui said it was alright for me to join you! I’m really excited.”

“Nice!! Lemme pull up the directions on my phone first…” Pearl replied.

Lillie hovered over Pearl as she navigated the Island Trial website, finding the location information she needed.

“Lush Jungle, just off of Route 5...” Pearl muttered to herself, tapping to add the location to a pin on her phone’s map.

“Oh! I did some research beforehand and I think there’s a motel near there… which should be nicer than a Pokemon Center room, I’d think.” Lillie said, pointing to the route on Pearl’s screen.

“Oh neat! It’ll be neat to actually stay at one of those, I like the feel they’ve got to ‘em.” Pearl said as she locked her phone and stretched.

“Well, you think we should head? I can tell you about the fire-type trial while we walk!”

Lillie nodded.

“Sounds good!”

  
  


So, Lillie and Pearl were off. It would seem Pearl’s storytelling was strong, as Lillie seemed invested in her tale.

“There was a hiker?!” she asked, both astonished and confused.

“Yea, his name was David! The whole thing was pretty fun!” Pearl replied.

Suddenly, Pearl stopped, as she could feel her phone buzz in her pocket. 

>Hey, this is Pearl, right? It’s Kiawe.

>>yep! you’ve got the right number :3

>Nice! I was just texting to ask what sort of timeline you’d have on getting to Lush Jungle?

>>i’m just leaving now so by tomorrow hopefully!

>Great! I’ll let Mallow know. Be safe 👍

“Who was that?” Lillie asked, leaning over Pearl’s shoulder.

“That was the trial captain, Kiawe! Just letting him know we’re on our way.”

“Oh, I see!” Lillie said with a nod, before looking around.

“Speaking of which… I think we’re here?”

“What do you mean?”

“At the bus stop, I mean.”

Pearl made a blank expression for a bit.

“I… thought we were gonna be walking?” she asked.

“Huh? But it’s a long walk - are you sure? I don’t have many supplies…” Lillie said, looking towards the ground.

Putting her hand on her shoulder, Pearl smiled at Lillie.

“Hey, it’s ok! I’ll be alright. And if you don’t wanna walk, you can take the bus!”

Lillie mumbled to herself a bit.

“Well, if you’re really sure… I guess I will. But could we call? I just want to… make sure you’re safe.”

“That’s totally cool by me! I’ll wait until the bus comes here to start walking.”

So, Pearl waited by Lillie’s side. As they waited, the sunny sky became overcast, but it didn’t quite rain. They talked about the more mundane things in life, like their favorite manga they’d been reading.

Finally, the bus arrived, and Pearl waved Lillie goodbye for the moment. About 5 minutes after the bus left, Pearl received a call from Lillie. Pearl plugged her microphone earbuds into her phone and put her phone in her bag, let out her pokemon, and started her trek.

The route was teeming with both wildlife and trainers, and Pearl confidently battled both. Lillie was a bit like a live commentator to all of Pearl’s battles, because while she couldn’t see them, the sounds of the battles were enough to get her excited.

At around the midway point of the route, Pearl found an odd-looking pure-white trailer parked on the side of the trail. But what was stranger, was a man standing outside of it is an almost ridiculously heavy overcoat… with a familiar haircut.

“Lillie… oh my gosh.” Pearl whispered into her mic.

“What is it, Pearl? Are you in danger?”

“No… okay, okay.” Pearl said, backtracking. “Have I ever told you about this idol I really like? Her name is Lune.”

“No, I don’t think so. I don’t think I’ve heard of her, either… I kind of live under a rock.”

“That’s ok! But what’s _NOT_ ok is how I’m like 99% sure her husband is standing ahead of me and I don’t know if I should ignore him or…?”

“How can you tell it’s him?”

“He has the strangest haircut and I’ve seen him in a few of her personal posts and videos...”

“Ohh, I see. Maybe approach him? I’m sure he gets talked to by fans all the time.”

“Alright… I’ll call you back!”

Pearl clicked her microphone to end the call, and slowly approached the man.

Despite having a family consisting of multiple champions and literal gods, Pearl had no idea how to talk to someone connected to one of her favorite musical artists.

As she came closer behind him, it would appear he was talking on the phone with someone via a hidden microphone in his glove - and his heavy outer layer looked like some kind of hefty lab coat.

“Yeah, yeah, I’ll be alright! Says the one who insists on going out in storms and having to get her ass dragged in by me.” … “If you and N show up here I’m personally divorcing both of you.” … “Right… well, I love the both of you too. I’ll be back before it gets too late, promise.”

The name he mentioned in the call only confirmed to Pearl that he was exactly who she thought he was.

Nervously, she spoke from behind him.

“You’re… Colress, right?”

Colress jumped and quickly turned around, and his face looked surprised and confused. Certainly, he wasn’t exactly expecting a teenage girl who was a fan of his wife’s work to find him on a hiking trail.

“Ye… yesssssssss?” he replied, confused.

Pearl could hear a muffled woman’s voice through the glove, though she couldn’t quite make it out - though she could only assume it was Lune herself.

Pearl was having a hard time not losing her cool and gushing to him, but she managed to collect herself so she didn’t go on a wild fangirling tangent.

The two stared at each other in silence, before Pearl spoke up.

“Uh… sorry! I’m just… a really big fan of Lune’s work and I didn’t think I’d see someone like _YOU_ out here, uhm…” Pearl’s words trailed off, almost uncharacteristically so.

It took a while for Colress to respond.

“Oh! To be honest, I didn’t really expect to see a fan out here, either, haha!” he said, pausing. “Do you, uh, want a picture, or something?”

Pearl’s eyes grew sparkly and she nodded quickly.

“Yes!! That'd be super cool!!”

She got her phone out and opened her camera, and moved next to Colress. He had a bit of an awkward smile on, but Pearl didn’t mind. She put up a peace sign and clicked a selfie of the two of them.

Pearl moved away and did a little dance while looking at the picture she’d just taken in excitement.

“Thank you so much!! My friend Hau is gonna LOSE IT when he sees this!!” she said with a big smile.

“Glad to hear!” Colress said, adjusting his glasses.

Lune’s laughter could be heard from his glove, to which he responded;

“...I forgot to hang up. Love you.”

Pearl did her best to hold back laughter as ended the call with an annoyed expression. Soon enough, Colress’s attention turned to that of Pearl’s pokemon - specifically Azul.

Pointing towards the brionne, Colress spoke with a tone of curiosity.

“That pokemon… that’s a brionne, right? They’re quite rare in the wild.”

“Uh… yea! His name’s Azul, he’s my baby!” Pearl said, picking up Azul from under the flippers and holding him.

“Interesting! Say, would you mind if I ran some personal tests in the Aether trailer over there?” he paused. “Sorry if that was too forward. I’ve been gathering data on the pokemon around here, and while he’s clearly domesticated, anything would be useful towards my research!”

Pearl admittedly looked a bit weirded out.

“Uh… sure? As long as you don’t poke him and he doesn’t leave my sight.”

“Of course! He’s your pokemon, after all. Here, follow me,” Colress motioned as he opened the door to the trailer. 

Pearl, still carrying Azul, followed.

The inside of the trailer was a very sleek and modern medical office, complete with an exam table for pokemon.

“This trailer was set up by the Aether Foundation as a checkpoint for their scientists, but I’ve since gained their permission to use it! Even though I don’t entirely… agree with them.” Colress said, tapping his hand on the exam table, where Pearl set Azul down.

“Never heard of ‘em!” Pearl replied as she watched Colress take off his gloves and replace them with less heavy-duty lab gloves.

“N says they give him bad vibes, and I sorta agree, but it’s better than dumping all on my equipment in the hotel!” Colress replied. He dug around in some drawers before pulling out lab equipment and setting it next to Azul.

Through the exam, Colress did his best to explain everything he was doing as to not worry Pearl, and to his surprise, Pearl understood a fair bit of it. 

Pearl did mention she was familiar with marine biology, and the two had a lengthy conversation about it as Colress conducted his test.

After about half an hour, Colress finished his tests and printed out a few sheets of paper and handed them to Pearl.

“And these are in-depth reports of Azul’s battle statistics and potential! Consider it an extra thank-you!” he said, pushing up his glasses.

“Wow… thank you!” Pearl replied, flipping through the papers. “So I’m good to go?”

“Yeah! Just be safe out there - there’s a pretty bad storm coming.”

“I will! It’s nothing I can’t handle!” Pearl said with a determined look. 

While Colress did look a little concerned, he still waved goodbye to her and thanked her once again for the assistance.

The air was damp when Pearl left the Aether trailer, so she took out her phone to call Lillie again and went on her way as fast as she could.

“Where WERE you?” was the first thing Lillie said upon picking up.

“It’s a long story…” Pearl replied.

She proceeded to tell Lillie what happened, and Lillie said she was glad it went so well. Lillie had already made it to the motel and gotten a room for the two, where she was waiting while playing with Nebby. Pearl promised she’d make it there as soon as she could.

Pearl arrived at the motel just before it started to rain - the wind had grown stronger and the sky had gone dark. 

When Lillie opened the room’s door in response to her knock, her eyes lit up and she asked if it was okay if she gave Pearl a hug - which Pearl responded with by giving Lillie a big hug herself.

The room was a standard motel room - there were two beds for humans, and one pokemon bed. There was a TV standing opposite from the beds, with a microwave by its side. The entire look of the room was very dated but… cozy. 

Pearl and Lillie changed into their pajamas and called it a night early.

“This is kind of like a sleepover!” Pearl said enthusiastically.

“Huh?” Lillie replied in confusion.

“Like… I’ve never been on one, but this feels like one, yaknow?”

“I mean… neither have I, but I guess it does…?”

“I think they got some popcorn with the microwave! We can make some and watch whatever’s on TV!”

“Oh, sure…!”

Lillie clicked on the TV and cruised the channels while Pearl put the popcorn bag in the microwave. The rain outside began to fall harder, and the aggressive wind and rain pounding against the building made itself heard.

“Ooh, stop here!” Pearl said to Lillie as she skipped onto the travel channel, which was currently showing a show about ghost hunting.

“Are you sure? It might be kinda creepy…”

“Nah, it’s all fake effects and actor pokemon! My aunt does this stuff for _real_ and she likes to make fun of how much these guys freak out.”

“Oh, that sounds cool! You’ll have to tell me about it while we watch.”

Pearl sat next to Lillie with the bag of popcorn as the two of them watched the ghost hunting show. Lillie ended up having to close her eyes at some points, while Pearl reassured her that the ghost pokemon were just actors. 

Pearl eventually fell asleep by Lillie’s side, to the sound of the wind and rain.

\--

The sun shone through the closed curtains, and slowly but surely, Pearl and Lillie woke up. Pearl’s pokemon, along with Nebby, had taken up the other empty bed, and were piled over each other in a cuddle puddle. Pearl thought it was adorable and snapped a picture before getting ready for the day.

Lillie was still groggy by the time Pearl had gotten dressed and ready to go, but said she was fine with staying inside.

Pearl called her pokemon to come along with her, and headed out the door into the sun - but not before texting Kiawe to let him know that she was ready.

The whole world smelled fresh, and though it was a bit muddy, Pearl didn’t mind. She eventually made it to the Lush Jungle, where a green-haired girl around Pearl’s age was leaning on the trial gates, on her phone.

Pearl called out and waved to her, assuming she was somehow related to the trial. The girl waved back and put her phone away, walking towards Pearl. 

“Heya! You must be Pearl, right? Kiawe described you pretty well and the bow is a bit of a giveaway.” she said.

“Haha, yep, that’s me! Are you Mallow?”

“Bingo! That would be me!” Mallow replied. “It’s gonna be interesting with last night’s storm, rain in that amount definitely makes the jungle more active!”

Pearl nodded along, and eventually, Mallow waved at her to follow past the trial gates.

“You ready?” she asked.

“Of course!” Pearl nodded, following Mallow into the jungle.

The sights and smells were almost overwhelming, especially after such a torrential downpour - just as Mallow had said. Light streamed through the thick foliage, and caused the dew on plants to glisten in its light.

Trailing behind Pearl was Poppy, as she gripped one of it’s strings. She figured that even though it wasn’t Poppy’s primary type, Poppy was still part flying-type, which would make it useful against grass types. 

Eventually, Mallow and Pearl came upon a clearing, where there was a campfire, cooking pot, and some log benches.

“Okay!” Mallow exclaimed. “These are the trial grounds! Here I need you to gather four items for the ultimate dish - a tiny mushroom, a mago berry, a revival herb, and a miracle seed!”

Pearl gained a bit of a confused look.

“That doesn’t sound… very appetizing.”

“Shh _shhhhh_! That doesn’t matter! I’ve let a pokemon guard each of these ingredients, and I’ve told them to be pretty obvious about it, so even though the forest is dense, you should be able to find them pretty quickly, knowing you!”

Pearl didn’t really know how to take compliments from strangers, so she simply thanked Mallow and laughed it off. 

With a determined nod, Pearl set out into the jungle to find Mallow’s ingredients. 

One, two, three, four! Though it took about an hour and a half to locate them through the dense jungle, Pearl found the pokemon guarding the ingredients. The weather had become warm to the point where Pearl was almost breaking a sweat, but the shade of the trees helped quite a bit.

Pearl headed back to the center clearing, and was rather surprised to see Kiawe and Lana waiting along with Mallow! They all waved to Pearl, and Pearl waved back.

“Awesome! Did you get all the ingredients?” Mallow asked.

“Yup! Though I don’t really understand how we’re gonna cook this…” Pearl replied.

Mallow let out a bit of a snort.

“That’s where my friends come in!” she said, motioning towards Kiawe and Lana.

“I brought a hard bone for mashing the ingredients up!” Kiawe said with a bright smile.

“...And I brought some fresh water to actually make it like, ‘soupy’...” Lana said quietly, pouring the handmade water jug she had out into the pot.

“Okay! Pearl! Drop those ingredients in and get mashing!” Mallow ordered, giving a confident, almost cheesy point.

Pearl was still a bit confused, and was high-key hoping she wouldn’t have to drink this ‘soup’. Still, she dropped the ingredients in and grabbed the bone, and got to it.

Mallow would continuously shout encouragement while adding spices to the soup, almost as if she was pretending they were in a cooking show. 

“ _ **STOP!!**_ ” Mallow suddenly shouted.

Pearl dropped the bone and wiped her brow off, taking a look at the vile-looking concoction she’d assisted in making. What was more vile, however, was the smell. Truly, that revival herb didn’t do good for the soup.

“We’re… not gonna eat this, right?” Pearl asked, covering her mouth and nose with her hand.

Mallow shook her head.

“Nope!”

A strong rustling could be heard in the bushes nearby, catching everyone but Mallow’s worried attention.

“But _SHE_ will!”

On the cue, the biggest lurantis Pearl had ever seen jumped out of the bushes and skittered towards the pot. Kiawe and Lana jumped out of the way, and the only one left in the lurantis’s way of the pot was Pearl.

The totem lurantis raised its claws and let out a screech, and Pearl and Poppy got into battle stance.

Poppy’s only flying-type move, gust, wasn’t the strongest. So Pearl was hoping to pull off the minimize strategy she’d used previously.

However, the lurantis began charging a move, absorbing sunlight. As Pearl prepared to switch to Cherry to take the hit, Pearl noticed the lurantis chewing on an odd-looking herb.

“ _Shit._ ” she mumbled.

The power herb allowed the lurantis to gather sunlight faster, and before Pearl could call out an attack, it slashed at Poppy with solar-charged claws - taking out a good half of Poppy’s HP.

Pearl was admittedly panicking a little. The battle was off to a bad start, and even after Poppy’s gust, the lurantis was still standing strong.

To add more insult to injury, the lurantis screeched into the sky, and a trumbeak came to its aid.

Luckily, this time, the lurantis had to charge its solar blade. Unluckily, the trumbeak had a surprise waiting - in the form of the move rock blast. It only took three consecutive hits for Poppy to go down, and it fainted with a sad deflating noise.

Pearl was stuck. She could switch out to Azul to defeat the trumbeak, but then Azul would be quickly taken out by lurantis’s solar blade. She could switch to Cherry, but… there’d be no way Cherry would last more than one turn.

With a frustrated sigh and a muttered ‘sorry’, Pearl decided to let Cherry stall to give her time to revive Poppy.

Cherry was quick to faint, and so the dance began.

Pearl brought out Azul and ordered him to attack the trumbeak - and in between the time it took for lurantis to charge its solar blade, Azul managed to take out the trumbeak and do a little damage on the lurantis. Still, Azul was taken out by solar blade in one hit. 

Pearl only had Poppy left, and it was only at half health.

She took a deep breath in and let it out of its pokeball, as lurantis called for its second reinforcement from the sky - this time, a castform.

‘Oh no.’ Pearl thought. She knew EXACTLY what that castform was about to do.

Looking back at the others, Mallow had an almost fiendish grin on her face, while Kiawe and Mallow were both cheering for Pearl.

Just as Pearl had expected, the castform used sunny day - turning the once dappled sunlight harsh. Crossing her fingers, Pearl ordered Poppy to use minimize once again, hoping to all the powers that be that lurantis would miss. 

And by some miracle, it did.

Lurantis looked frustrated, and Pearl, who had practically been holding her breath for the past few minutes, let out a huge relieved sigh.

But this wasn’t the end.

The castform was effectively useless against Poppy, the real threat was lurantis. Just because Poppy avoided one attack didn’t mean it’d avoid the next. So, holding her hand tight, Pearl took a moment to heal Poppy before ordering the next gust attack on lurantis.

It was the moment of decision - Poppy was getting tired… but so was lurantis. But… Pearl knew Poppy couldn’t survive the attacks of both pokemon. So, to the confusion of Mallow, Pearl revived Azul.

Solar blade took Poppy out, but when Poppy fainted, it almost seemed as though it ‘burst’ in a flash of ghastly screams.

It was Poppy’s ability - aftermath.

The final damage was enough to take out the lurantis, who fell to the ground in an extravagant thud. 

All that was left was the castform, who quickly realized what it had coming. Pearl released Azul, and due to the castform’s sunny weather type-change, it was easily fainted by Azul.

And that was that.

With a half yell, half sigh, Pearl dropped to her knees.

“ _ **HOOOOOOOOOOLY SHIIIIIIIIIIIIIIT.**_ ” she exclaimed, flapping one of her hands as both an attempt to fan herself and because she was simply overwhelmed.

“DO YOUR PARENTS LET YOU SWEAR LIKE THAT?!” Lana yelled from the bench, before being softly bapped on the head by Kiawe.

Mallow seemed genuinely surprised.

“You know, usually my trial is the make-or-break one for most trainers… but you… did it?” she said with an astonished look. “No, seriously, how did you do that?! That was amazing!!”

Mallow offered to help heal Pearl’s pokemon, and Lana and Kiawe joined the group to help heal lurantis - who took the pot of ‘soup’ and scuttled back into the brush.

Once Pearl’s pokemon were fully healed, she made sure to release Poppy and give it a big hug - as well as apologize to Cherry for using her as cannon fodder.

“Well! Go ahead and take out your passport - I’ve got a well-deserved reward for you!” Mallow said with a proud smile.

Pearl nodded and gave Mallow her passport, and Mallow stamped her very green symbol of completion in.

“Thank you so much!!” Pearl said with another nod, putting her passport away.

“Yea, it’s no problem!” Mallow replied.

Kiawe stepped in a bit.

“Hey, hope you don’t mind me asking, but after that battle, I’m really curious… your full name is ‘Pearl Markov’, correct?” he asked.

Pearl nodded

“Yep! Why do you ask? Did I accidentally spell it wrong?”

“No, no… I was just wondering if you were in any way related to a ‘Renee Markov’? As in, champion, region manager of the Hoenn League?”

Pearl looked a bit dumbfounded for a second.

“Yea…? That’s my mom!” she replied enthusiastically.

Kiawe pumped his fist and pointed at Lana.

“CALLED IT! You owe me 5 dollars!”

Lana looked defeated as she shuffled through her wallet, and Pearl was just left… confused. Lana attached the money to a fishing pole and started running.

“Come get it then!!”

“ _ **HEY!!**_ ”

Kiawe proceeded to chase Lana around, who was laughing as she dangled the money in front of him.

Mallow giggled a bit, and explained to Pearl;

“It’s cool, they’re just goofing around. The three of us are like siblings, and being the crafty youngest one, Lana likes to tease Kiawe a lot.” she said before pausing. “I think they have the suspicion that being a strong trainer runs in the family, haha!”

“Ohhhhhhhhhh!” Pearl said in realization.

“Anyways, your next stop would be the island’s Kahuna! I’d take you there to her, but I’m a bit booked for today in regards to challengers… I can take you tomorrow, though!”

Pearl nodded and smiled at Mallow.

“Of course! It gives me some time to catch up with my friends!”

“Wonderful! I’ll catch you tomorrow then!” Mallow said with a cheeky wink, before running back towards Kiawe and Lana, telling them to cut it out.

As Pearl stretched and approached the jungle’s exit, she couldn’t help but notice a familiar face waving towards her.

“Hey Pearl!! So how’d it go?” Hau called out.


End file.
